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Reminiscences t 

"Distinquished Men.^ 



WITH 






AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY. 



BY 



WM. B. SLAUGHTER. 



MA.DISON, WIS. 
PUBLISHED FOR THE AUTHOR. 



V 



im 






MILWAUKEE: 

Godfrey & Crandall, Printers and Publishers. 
1878. 



c55 






g-ifZ) 



CONTENTS. 111. 



7 > 



CONTENTS 



AUTOBIOGRAPHY— Childhood and Youth—James- 
town—Gen. La Fayette— "Wont West"— Tom 
Ewing — Bardstown — John Hayes — Valedic- 
tory — Gen. Jackson — Indiana — Wisconsin — 
Lecture on Civilization — Fourth of July Ora- 
tion — Sketch of Madison ,. 1-58 

CHAP. I — George W.^sniNGmN — The Family — His 
Youth — Surveying— Lawrence Washington — 
F-ench Creek — Fort Necessity — Braddock's 
Defeat— Marriage and Fanning — Slavery— 
The Revolution— Resignation — The Constitu- 
tion — As President — French Revolution-Sick- 
ness and Death 59-94 

CHAP. II — Julius Cesak — Youth — Memory — Pirates 
— Debts — In Spain — Vicissitudes — Greatness 
—Commentaries — Latin Tongue 95-101 

CHAP. Ill — John Marshall — Family— ^In the Revo- 
lution — In Congress — Phil. Slaughter — Chief 
Justice — Stick Gig — Lean Horse — Young Skep- 
tics — Domestic Character — Convention in Vir- 
ginia — Chancellor Kent — Judge Story 102-124 

CHAP. IV — Thosias Jefper-son — His Father — Educa- 
tion — Labors in Virginia — Declaration of In- 
dependence — Residence— Mountains— His Ac- 
complishments — Patrick Henry— Minister to 
France — Philosophy — Religious Views — Do- 
mestic Life 125-145 

CHAP. V. — Jajies Madison — Youth — Religious Free- 
dom — Constitution — Federalist— Independ- 
ence in Congress — Resolutions of 1798-99 — 
Secretary of State —President — Montpelier — 
His wife "Dolly." 146-158 



IV. CONTENTS. 

CHAP. VI — Andrew Jackson — Visit at Hermitage — 
Battle of New Orleans — White Sulphur 
Springs — Character — Youth — Valor — The 
Muddy Boots — Reformation in Tennessee 
Bullies— Col. Harrison — Duel^Dreek Indians 
— Power Over Men--Florida — New Orleans- 
Judge Hall— Presidency 159-179 

CHAP. VII— John Randolph— A Man Stii Generis — 
Pochahontas— Loss of Mother — Reverence for 
England — His Genius — Oratory — Speech at 
Halifax Court House— Character 1 80-197 

CHAP. VIII— Henky Clay— Early Life— Peter Dea- 
con — Denny's Store — Clerkship — Superiority 
— With Chancellor Wythe— Character of Ed- 
ucation — Self Improvement— In Congress — 
Colonizing 'Slaves— Land Titles in Kentucky 
—Character '. 198-225 

CHAP. TX— Thos. Ewixg— Visit to Him— His Early 
Life— Thii-st for Books— Life at the Salt Worlcs 
— Self-Instructions — Success as a Lawyer — As 
a Senator— As a Cabinet Officer — Character- 
istics 226-238 

CHAP. X — Wm. C. Rives— Education— Student witn 
Jefferson — Political Advancement — Minister 
to France — Delegate to Peace Convention — In- 
scription upon His Tomb— His Character 239-243 

CHAP. XI- -John C. Calhoun — Descent — Early Life — 
As a Student — Distinction as a Graduate — 
Learns Law for Politics — Course as to War, 
Bank and Tariff— As a Cabinet Officer— Free 
Trade and Nullification —Warrant for his 
Arrest— His Character and INIode of Life — His 
Writings— Death 244-262 

CHAP. XII— Daniel Webster— Parentage and Birth 
— Childhood — Gifts as a Reader — Learns the 
Constitution- Latin Grammar -In Phillip's 
Academy— Anecdotes In College— First Ora- 
tion — As a Law Student — Jeremiah Smith's 
Opinion —First Speech in Congress — Chief 
Justice Mai-shall's Estimate— Views on Finance 
-On the Tariff -As a Lawyer— Judge Story 
and the Dartmouth College Case— His Orator>' 
— Davy Crockett's Opinion— Speech at Bel- 
lows Falls— Appearance Sketched — Extracts 
from His Speeches 263-295 



INTRODUCTION. 



Two motives conspire to induce me to offer this book to the 
public: Tiie first is to acquire the means of subsistence; the 
second is to add something to the stock of human knowledge 
and thereby increase human happiness; and while I do not 
expect to present any new truths, for tliat would imply a sepa- 
rate creation, yet the manifestations of old truths are as 
various as the ever varying phases of nature; and these 
possess the interest of new truths. Man is said to be the 
universe in miniature; that there is no form of which he is 
not the type, no tone to which his being is not the respoiLse. 
"The proper stud\f then of mankind is man." Observation is 
the first fruitful source of knowledge regarding men, becaiLse 
in addition to the five senses which are channels of communi- 
cation, we are endowed with spirit or mind, which is etherial, 
all-pervasive, and eternal. Biography is the next best source 
of information. It is not only the written life of man, it is 
also a record of human character. In the hands of a skillful 
artist it is a living image. Self-knowledge is the key to unlock 
the hidden knowledge of others. I shall therefore commence 
my work with an autobiographical sketch, adorned only with 
simple truth, which will constitute its chief merit. I am con- 
scious of no desire for notoriet}', I have outlived the love of 
fame, and if I had acquired fame when young, it would have 
killed me, as it has killed thousands in every age of the world. 

Autobiograjihy is the highest source of personal knowledge, 
reminiscences next, biograjjhy third, and history last. In the 
first, we have the consciousness of our secret thoughts and 
actions; in the second, the visible form and apparent life; in 
the third, the record of human character; and in 
the fourth, a narrative of human events, the causes of which 



are frequently left to conjecture. I shall endeavor to show 
that there are but few elementary priacii)les in the character 
of man; that during the last two thousand years, but two 
individuals, Julius Ctesar and George Washington, liave pos- 
sessed them in an eminent degree; that they are alike in all 
men, differing only in degree; and that there are but four 
such elementary jirinciples: first, "'honesty of purpose;" 
second, practical common sense; third, self-knowledge; fourth, 
self-government. In these elementary principles there is un- 
varying unity; in their manifestations to the world, under the 
influence of surrounding circumstances, there is endless variety. 

Let no one hesitate to subscribe for this book because I am in 
my eighty-second year. ('ato learned Greek at eighty; 
Sophocles wrote his grand Qi^dipus at eighty ; Goethe wrote 
his Faust at eighty; Simonides bore off the prize of verse 
from his competitors at eighty; and Theophrastus at four 
score and ten had just begun his characters of men. Mind 
has its parallel in physical nature; tlie succulent plant is of 
rapid growth and quick decay; the stui'dy oak is of slow 
growth and lasts for centuries, anfl the cedars of Lebanon, 
under wliich St. John preached J 847 years ago, are still stand- 
ing crowned with their youthful verdure. 

My reminiscences will include LaFayette, Chief Justice Mar- 
shall, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, Gen. Andrew Jack- 
son, John Randolph of Roanoke, Wm. C Rives, Thomas 
Ewing, John C. Calhoun, Daniel Webster and Henry Clay. 



Autobiography^ of the Author 




WAS born on the 19th day of April, 1797, in 
the County of Culpepper, in the State of 
Virginia, the son of Samuel and Francis Slaughter, both 
of English descent, and both well educated. My father 
was an excellent Greek and Latin scholar, and his taste 
m English literature was formed by reading such authors 
as Johnson, Addison, Goldsmith, Swift, Steele and Par- 
nell. His children, of whom he had thirteen, (three sons, 
of whom I was the eldest, and ten daughters), were edu- 
cated at home in private classical schools under his own 
observation. I completed my education at William and 
Mary College; although I was there but a short time and 
not a class student, I learned rapidly and rarely forgot 
what I learned. 1 was always fond of adventure; 
romance, whether in real life or m the realm of imagina- 



2 AUTOBIOGRAPHY 

tion fascinated me ; 1 was a student at the time of the publi- 
cation of Sir Walter Scott's novels, and devoured them as 
they came from the press. I thought " Jennie Deans" 
the most perfect character ever conceived in the world of 
thought, I said my parents were of English descent. 
Addison in his Spectator speaks of "Slaughter's Coffee 
House" as a place where the wits of London as- 
sembled to discuss literary subjects, and I have some- 
times imagined I have seen old Sam. Johnson in that 
club, presiding with assumed dignity and conscious su- 
periority, while poor Goldsmith was shrinking from ob- 
servation. How or whence my ancestors derived their 
name, I am at a loss to conjecture. We know that at one 
period in English history many families took their names 
from their occupation ; as the Carters, Waggoners, Wea- 
vers, etc.; and so may the Slaughters have done, whether 
of high or low degree. If they slew whole regiments of 
men, they were warriors or heroes ; if only a few individ- 
uals, they were murderers ; if they slew innocent brutes 
they were butchers. We infer from the motto on the family 
coat of arms, said to have been given to them by William 
the Conqueror, that they were warriors and his followers, 
and that the motto "invicta Jidektatis proemium,'' The Re- 
ward of Invincible Fidelity, was a tribute due to their 
merit. If their propensities were ever warlike, they have 
been thoroughly eradicated by the arts of peace and the 
meliorating influences of civilization. I said I was fond 
of adventure and loved romance. I had an opportunity 
of gratifying my romantic tastes on my way to William 
and Mary College I spent one night at Jamestown, the 



OF THE AUTHOR. 3 

cradle of a great and flourishing State, but now a wilder- 
ness without an inhabitant. Sixty years ago, when I was 
there, a solitary Irishman was the only inhabitant, and 
his sole occupation was that of transporting students to 
and from the steamboat landing on the James river and 
Williamsburg, the seat of William and Mary College. I 
landed at Jamestown about eight o'clock in the evenmg, 
and after taking a very frugal repast with my solitary 
host, I wandered forth under the mellowing influence of 
a moonhght night in early October to see the ancient 
city. I was not disappointed. I saw king Powhattan 
sitting in the door of his wigwam, decked with the regalia 
of royal authority, surrounded by his savage warriors 
recHning upon their mother earth, while the chiefs, or 
head men, were deliberating upon the fate of Captain 
John Smith, their prisoner, bound hand and foot. Sud- 
denly I heard a female shriek, and looking around, I saw 
Pocahontas prostrating herself between the gallant Smith 
and the uplifted club of the unfeeling savage, and by this 
heroic act preserving the life of this daring adventurer. 
Although her mind had never been illuminated by the 
beams of science, or polished by the refinements of civili- 
zation ; although she had been accustomed from her 
infancy to the contemplation of scenes ot the most sav- 
age barbarity, yet the spark of compassion which nature 
had kindled in her bosom had not been extinguished ; and 
when she beheld the object of her affections about to be 
sacrificed to the fury of the blood-thirsty savage, it broke 
forth with a lustre which will shed an enduring halo 
around . her memory, Pocahontas has commanded the 



4 AUTOBIOGRAPHY 

admiration of the old world as well as the new. She was 
beautiful in person, lovely in disposition, gentle in man- 
ners. The latter quality she had in conmion with Bea- 
trice, Desdemona and Eve. It is to be regretted the 
latter did not transmit her gentle qualities to her strong- 
minded daughters of our age. The day following my 
nocturnal visit to the royal wigwam, mine iiosi took me 
to Williamsburg. This was the seat of Government dur- 
ing the Colonial period, but, at that time in a very dilap- 
idated condition, and supported solely by William and 
Mary College. Beside the College building there was 
but little to attract attention. The old Government 
House, a small two-story brick building, and the Raleigh 
Tavern of the same character of building, were the two 
most prominent objects, with both of which were con- 
nected interesting incidents. From V/illiam and Mary 
College I went to HaUfax county, Virginia, to study law 
with my uncle William B. Banks, a man of genius, learn- 
ing and eloquence. His speeches at the bar, sometimes 
in behalf of oppressed innocence,"sometimes in behalf of 
the liberty and life of the citizen, filled me with an ardent 
desire to imitate, and even to rival him in the art of ora- 
tory. With that view I became for the first time in my 
life, a close student. Hitherto I had not known what it 
was to reason or to think seriously or profoundly. I had 
not realized that out of thought alone arises knowledge, 
which is power. My uncle was the intimate personal 
friend and neighbor of John Randolph of Roanoke, and 
through him I became acquainted with that eccentric 
genius. Of him, however, I will speak in the proper 



OF THE AUTHOR. 5 

place, when giving my reminiscences of distinguished 
men, which will constitute the principal part of this book. 

During the two years I remained with my uncle I read 
law, history, commentaries on government, the great 
speeches of the great men of the world on law and civil 
polity ; likewise the poems of Homer, Virgil, Dante, 
Camoens, Shakspeare, Milton and Byron ; many of the 
striking portions of which still remain in my memory 
Once my uncle came into my office about eleven o'clock 
at night and found me reading the history of Charles I, 
of England. He inquired whether I had ever seen the 
epitaph found on the tombstone of John Bradshaw, Pres- 
ident of the Regicides. I replied that I had not He 
said that he had heard President Madison read it from a 
letter containing it, which he had received from a friend 
in England. He repeated it to me, and being a very 
remarkable composition, I deem it worthy of repetition 
here ; I give it from memory : 

"Here lies deposited the dust of John Bradshaw, who 
presided in that illustrious band of patriots, and who, 
nobly superior to all selfish regards, disdaining alike the 
pageantry of power, the blasts of calumny, and the ter- 
rors of Royal vengeance, fairly and openly adjudged 
Charles Stuart, tyrant of England, to a public and igno- 
minious death, thereby exhibiting to the astonished world, 
and transmitting down through applauding ages, the most 
glorious example of the love of freedom and impartial 
justice ever exhibited on the blood-stained theatre of 
human actions. Oh, reader ! pass not on till thou hast 



6 AUTOBIOGRAPHY 

blest his memory, and never, Oh, never, forget that resist- 
ance to tyrants is obedience to God." 

The two years confinement in my uncle's law office 
was too severe a tax upon my nervous system, and my 
health gave way. I spent one summer at the White 
Sulphur Springs, receiving but little benefit ; the next in 
Culpepper among my relatives ; and in October, 1 824, I 
joined a party of three hundred persons who chartered a 
boat at Alexandria, Virgmia, to take us to Yorktown to 
welcome the Marquis De La Fayette on the plains of 
York, on which Lord Cornwallis surrendered his sword 
to the American arms on the 19th of October, 1781. 
Nearly fifty thousand people had assembled to pay their 
homage to the General who had voluntarily given his 
money and his services to aid us in our struggles for lib- 
erty. Forty-seven years had elapsed since he drew his 
sword in our cause, and many of his compatriots were 
sleeping the sleep that knows no waking. Their sons 
and grandsons were led thither by a light that illuminates 
without dazzling, and were animated by a warmth that 
invigorates without consuming. It was the light of truth 
that guided them ; it was patriotic ardor that warmed 
them. It was on this occasion that Mr. Calhoun, then 
Secretary of War, said, "Let Virginia, like the mother of 
the Gracchi when called upon for her jewels, point to 
her sons." La Fayette was at this time sixty-seven years 
of age ; he was about five feet ten inches in height, his 
features strongly marked and coarse, without variety of 
expression, and evincing but little animation. Judging 
from his appearance I should never have taken him for 



OF THE AUTHOR. 7 

one of the great actors in the drama of human life, and 
yet he was one of the most remarkable men of the age in 
which he lived. By mere force of principle, by incor- 
ruptible integrity, and by uniform consistency, he passed 
through greater extremes of fortune than almost any man 
that ever lived. He acted a controlUng part in two of 
the most important revolutions the world has ever seen^ 
without a stain of dishonor, professing the same principles 
amid the ruins of the Bastile, in the Champ de Mars, 
under the despotism of Bonaparte, and in the dungeons 
of Olmutz. His fainily was one of the most ancient of 
the Fr(^nch nobility. His father was killed in battle in 
Germany at the age of twenty-five years, and his mother 
died shortly atter, leaving him an infant, the heir to an 
immense estate. At nineteen years of age he was an 
officer of the French Guards and a Captain of Dragoons. 
The States General, which became the constituent Assem- 
bly, met in May, 1789, formed and controlled by La 
Fayette. Two days after the fall of the Bastile he was 
appointed Commander in Chief of the National Guards 
of Paris, which embraced three millions of men, and which 
became the controlling power of the country. Although 
a royal subject, he was in principle a Republican, and 
defended the freedom of the King as he defended the 
freedom of the people. His courage and coolness saved 
the lives of the King and the Queen from the mob that 
took possession of the Palace of Versailles. He offered 
to assist Napoleon in his escape to America, after demand- 
ing his abdication, and after refusing a Peerage offered 
by Napoleon. 



8 AUTOBIOGRAPHY 

Hearing that the American colonies had declared their 
independence, he resolved to draw his sword in the cause 
of American liberty. Accordingly he purchased a vessel, 
and with a few officers put to sea. He landed in South 
Carolina and proceeded by land to Philadelphia, where 
Congress was then in session. He addressed a letter to 
the President of Congress asking leave to enter the army 
as a volunteer and to serve without pay. Leave was 
granted, and he was commissioned Major General of the 
army of the United States, lacking more than a month of 
being twenty years of age. He was shot through the leg 
at Brandy wine, but was not aware of it until reminded 
by his aid that the blood was running out of his boot. 
His gallantry on that and other similar occasions, was 
such as to induce General Washington to invite him to 
become a member of his military family. 

The State of Virginia had invited John Marshall, Major 
Gabriel Long and Captain Philip Slaughter to accom- 
pany La Fayette through the State. They met him at 
Yorktown and proceeded to Richmond, the Capitol of 
the State, and the residence of John Marshall. Multi- 
tudes called to pa> their respects to the patriot hero who 
was the companion of their grand sires and the guest of 
the grand children — the connecting Hnk of the two gen- 
erations. From Richmond the accompanying party 
proceeded to the interior of the State, receiving the same 
cordial welcome. At the dinner in the county of Orange, 
Mr. Madison oiit'ered the following toast : "Give me that 
iberty which has patriotism for its guest and gratitude for 
its feast." 



OF THE AUTHOR. 9 

Having recovered my health in 1825, I anticipated 
Horace Greeley's advice to young men, and went west. 
The most practicable mode of travel in those days was 
on horse-back, and thus I proceeded on my journey. I 
reached Charleston on the Kanawha, in October 1825, 
remained there two months with my relatives, thence 
went to Lancaster, Ohio, where I became ac([uainted 
with the Hon. Thomas Ewing, the first distinguished man 
I met in the west, and with whom I formed a friendship 
that lasted during his life — a life fraught with honorable 
deeds, with patriotic sentiments, and with generous sym- 
pathies. 

In January, 1826, I rode with his father on hijrseback 
from Lancaster, Ohio, to Columbus; had heard of Mr. 
Ewing as an operator in trie salt works in Kanawha, and 
supposed that the tonic influence of salt had given him 
great physical vitality. My surprise may be judged ot 
when Mr. Ewing asked me if ray attention had been 
called to the number of titles given by Virgil to xEneas. 
I replied that in speaking of him as a statesman he called 
him the great yEneas; as a warrior, the warlike /Eneas ; 
in bearing his father Anchises upon his shoulders from 
the flames of Troy, he was called the pious .Eneas ; and 
in leading his son Julius by the hand to save him from 
the devouring flames, he was called pater /Eneas. Mr. 
Ewing remarked that when he and Dido left the cave in 
which they had taken refuge from the storm, he was called 
Trojanus ^neas. I then perceived that the salt which 
flavored my companion's food was not muriate of soda, 
but attic, with its sparkUng brilliaicy. A tie of mutual 



lO AUTOBIOGRAPHY 

friendship was thus formed which was broken only by 
Mr. Evving's death. The subject of ^-Eneas' titles recently 
drew forth the following correspondence between Gen. 
Thomas Ewing, son of the late Thomas Ewing, and 
myself: 

Washington, D. C, Jan. 26, 1878. 

To Col. IV. B. Slaughter, 

My Dear Sir : — I have received and read with great 
interest your letter of the 1 6th ult. I am pleased with 
your rerniniscenses of my father, and I will be glad to 
see your book when published. Please put me on your 
list of subscribers. Father's reference to the various 
titles given by Virgil to .E^neas, reminds me of a jeu (f esprit 
of Chesterfield, which probably he had .never seen, or he 
would have referred to it. It is as follows : 

Virgil, whose magic verse enthralls, 
And who in verse is greater ? 
By turns his wandering hero calls 
Now pious, and now pater; 
But when compelled the worst to brave, 
An action which must pain us, 
He meets Queen Dido in the cave, 
He calls him dux Trojanus ; 
And well he changes, thus the word, 
How on this occasion sure, 
Pious ^Eneas were absmxl 
And j'titer premature . 

Yours truly, 

Thomas Ewing. 

In reply to the above letter of Mr. Ewing, I wrote : 
"Many years ago among the disnnguished members of 
the bar of Richmond, Virginia, were J'^hn Wickham, the 
American Cicero Jack Warden, the American Theo- 
sites; William Wirt, the poet orator and his historian, 
and George Hay, the fanciful dec iaimer. This last named 
gentleman, after one of his most fanciful declamations 



OF THE AUTHOR. 1 1 

was followed by Mr. Wickham. While indulging in his 

satirical comments on Mr. Hay's speech, Jack Warden 

said, '■'■sotto voce" to Mr. Wirt, "■Habet fenii/n in co/nu,'" 

upon which Wirt, with inimitable tact wrote : 

"When Wickham once toss'ti Hay in Court. 
On a dilemma's horns for sport ; 
Jack, rich in wit, and Latin too, 
Cried ''''habet feniim in cornii." 

After remaining a week at Columbus, 1 proceeded on 
my journey to Kentucky, the then Eldorado of all Vir- 
ginians, and the "Ultima Thule" of my heart's desires. 
On my way I spent one night at Circleville. I was very 
much interested during the evening in listening to a con- 
versation between three or four lawyers who had acci- 
dentally met at the hotel, in relation to a very remarkable 
character who had lived there some fifteen or twenty 
years previously, and in the course of nature had disap- 
peared from the stage of life. He called himself Cad- 
bury, and that was the extent of the information he gave 
of himself. He was very silent except when intoxicated, 
and then he was harsh in his language and forbidding in 
his appearance. It was on such occasions only that 
anything could be learned of his previous life. He was 
an Englishman by birth, and from the city of London ; 
was highly educated and well acquainted with some of 
the distinguished literateurs of that period. His peculi- 
arities were such as to render him a subject of sport when 
intoxicated for the idle and the mischievous , even then 
when a gleam of his former self shone upon him, he 
turned such a look of scorn and contempt upon his com- 
panions as to wither for the time being their vulgar sport. 



12 AUTOBIOGRAPHY 

With a view to his annoyance he was arrested and taken 
before a magistrate, charged with a breach of the peace 
in having struck Dr. Scott forcibly and violently. He 
was at the trial sober, and allowed to make his own 
defence. He commented with great learning upon the 
principles of the common law which we had received 
from England as the basis of all good government, upon 
the writ of habeas corpus, the trial by jury, and represent- 
ation in the halls of legislation. He dwelt upon the 
duties of the citizen, the strict performance of which was 
necessary to the happiness of the body politic, and 
especially of the conduct of those who were governed by 
the golden rule of doing unto others as they would have 
others do unto them. He spurned with the utmost scorn 
the idea that he had struck Dr. Scott in anger. He said 
Dr. Scott was an honorable man, an acco'Tiphshed gen- 
tleman, and his friend ; that he had struck him in anger 
was an impossibility ; there was no truth in the charge. 
It was gotten up for his annoyance by the meddlesome, 
the idle, and the mischievous ; by characters whom, as 
Junius says, "resemble the filth at the bottom of a lake, 
which, durmg the storm rises to the surface, but which, 
when the calm succeeds, settles down to its original obscu- 
rity." This quotation from Junius had not then been 
published to the world ; it is found in Woodfall's edition, 
which, at the request of Junius, was sealed up and not 
to be opened until a certain political event occurred 
which did occur ten or twelve years subsequent to the 
quotation by Cadbury.* 

*rhe gentleman giving this history inferred Cad bury was Junius, or 
his "confidante." Junius had said his secret should die with him. 



OF THE AUTHOR. ij 

I arrived at Bardstown, Kentucky, in February, i8'26, 
and found as many Slaughters as I left in Virginia. Un- 
cles, aunts and cousins, innumerable, one of whom, the 
daughter of an uncle, I married: Kentucky was settled 
principally by Virginians, many of whom inherited the 
lands they lived on. 

Bardstown derived its name from the number of poets 
who resided there. It was famous also for its jurists and 
its orators. The jurists were Joe. Davis, John Allen, 
Jonn Rowan, Ben. Hardin, and Charles Wickhffe. Joe 
Davis was a man of genius with its accompanying excen- 
tricities, which led to the sacrifice of his life at the battle 
of Tippecanoe. He was learned, eloquent, impetuous, 
and rash. He was greatly deficient in self-government, 
one of the four primary and elementary principles in the 
character of every great man. He was very unequal in 
his eftbrts, and was really great only when under the 
influence of violent passions. 

John Allen was a man of thought, of reason, and of 
reflection ; of decided ability as a lawyer, of sound judg- 
ment, unimpassioned, and self- governed. 

John Rowan was a man of genius, but very meta- 
physical. He had a great reputation as a criminal advo- 
cate at the bar, and it was said of him that out of a hun- 
dred clients charged with capital offences, he failed to 
defend successfully, but one. In conversation he was 
learned, brilliant and witty, but never humorous. Ben. 
Hardin was a man of unquestioned ability of discrimi- 
nating judgement, of practical common sense and accu- 
rate knowledge of men ; he had, however, but little refine- 



14 AUTOBIOGRAPHY 

ment in his tastes, and was rough in his manners. John 
Randolph, of Roanoke, said he reminded him of a 
kitchen-knife wlietted on a brick-bat ; it cut rough, but 
very deep. Charles Wicklifte was a man of ability and 
learning in the profession of the law, successful as a poli- 
tician, efficient as an executive officer, and conservative 
in all things. The orators par excellence, were Clayton 
Slaughter and John Hayes. Clayton Slaughter was a 
student almost all his life, and his oratory was of the 
highest order, chaste, classic and brilliant ; it would grat- 
ify the cultivated taste, while it would not stir the pas- 
sions ; it would enlighten the head while it would not 
improve the heart. Of John Hayes, Ben Hardin said, 
"he is the only man in listening to whom I am reminded 
of the saymg of the poet, "thoughts that breathe and 
words that burn." He was indeed a most remarkable 
man — to genius of the highest order, was united a sensi- 
bility almost morbid, and a temperament steeped in mel- 
ancholy. His habits were those of a recluse, and his 
haunt a solitude. He had but little sympathy with his 
fellow men, and mingled with them only on great occa- 
sions. The love 'of fame was his over-mastering passion, 
and burned within him with an unquenchable flame; 
upon its altar he sacrificed health, wealth, honor, hope, 
and life. In stature he was tall and spare, his features 
Roman, his eyes a dark hazel, his manner unobtrusive, 
his countenance wore an habitual sadness, and his voice 
was all music. While his appearance attracted the atten- 
tion of the multitude, the music of his voice resembling 
the feeble wail of persecuted and oppressed innocense, 



OF THE AUTHOR. 15 

thrilled their hearts. They were willing victims to his 
power, and followed him in his wonderful extravaganzas. 
In his moments of eloquent exaltation he acknowledged 
no superior, he tolerated no equal. In denouncing the 
unhallowed ambition of Naj^oleon he said, "he had des- 
olated the homes of the aged, had taken life from man- 
hood, had left orphans to ])Lrish with hunger, had purpled 
streams with human gore, and deserved to be banished, 
as he was, to a distant isle, in a wilderness of wateis, 
where the howling of the tempests and the roaring of the 
waves might be conjoined to the tumultuous agitations 
of his guilty conscience ; where he could pine over the 
innumerable crimes which in this life had banished him 
from the society of the good, and which in the world to 
come, must forever consign him to that of fiends and 
devils. Oh ! thou spirit of Napoleon ; thou hadst energy, 
but it was the energy of the tempest ; thou hadst splen- 
dor, but it was the splendor of a world on fire ; thou 
hadst sublimity, but it was the sublimity of Chaos." 

Having about this time commenced the practice of the 
law at Bardstown, I wa^ requested by Judge Booker, on 
the evening preceding the commencement of the session 
of the Circuit Court, to address the Grand Jury on the 
following day on the subject of their duties as grand 
jurors. I had been but a short time in the State, had 
formed but few acquaintances, had no intimate friends to 
sympathize with me in my troubles. I knew that the 
bar was composed of able and learned men ; that John 
Hayes, the unequalled orator, had abandoned his dissi- 
pated habits and would be present in court. I had never 



1 6 AUTOBIOGRAPHY 

appeared in court as an attorney, and was almost over- 
whelmed at the thought of making my debut in the 
presence of such an array of talent, ability and learning. 
I had never spoken in public, except after thorough prep- 
aration, and then by reading what I had written. 

Unfortunately I had selected intemperance as the vice 
to which I called the particular attention of the grand 
jury, and which was prevailing in Kentucky at that time 
to an alarming extent. Its indulgence had cut short the 
career of some of the most gifted young men ever born 
m the State, had sent to an early grave some of her giant 
intellects in the prime of manhood, and indeed but few 
octogenarians were found in the land. Upon rising to 
address the jury I saw John Hayes sitting near me, per- 
fectly sober, neatly dressed, and calmly waiting to hsten 
to my address. I almost shuddered as the thought of his 
classic taste and burning eloquence flashed across my 
mind, and but for the fact that I had in my mind a cata- 
logue of the offences against the law to which it was 
necessary to call the attention of the jury previous to any 
comments upon particular offences, I should have been 
utterly overwhelmed. This was the second time, through 
the influence of friends, Mr. Hayes had succeeded in 
abandoning intoxicating drinks ; and in doing so he not 
only gratified his personal friends but the whole commu- 
nity as well, who felt proud of his extraordinary endow- 
ments, which had commanded the admiration of legisla- 
tive assemblies as well as the great body of the people on 
the Hustings. 

I said : Gentlemen of the jury, it is beyond the power of 



OF THE AUTHOR. 17 

language to portray the evils of the intoxicating bowl. 
They are all the more fatal because so insidious, because 
their inception is in connection with the exercise of the 
social and friendly feelings of our nature. The danger 
lurking beneath is unsuspected, or if warned of the dan- 
ger, men fancy the warning applies not to them. I need 
not here trace the successive steps by which the convivial 
man, the cheerful, kind-hearted friend, the genial com- 
panion, the man of wit, of eloquence, of learning, the 
happy husband and father, the good neighbor and citizen, 
the exemplary christian, becomes at last, sottish, morose 
and quarrelsome, clouded in intellect, benumbed in feel- 
ing, faltering in speech, unfaithful as a husband, cruel as 
a parent, a terror or nuisance to society, an outcast of 
the world and of heaven. 

"A social glass at a convivial board is frequently the 
prelude to the ruin that ensues, and the victim of intem- 
perance frequently travels a long distance the road to 
ruin, 'ere he is aware of his danger. That still, small 
voice, which never speaks but at the approach of danger, 
whispers in his ear in such persuasive, dulcet tones, that 
he is at once arrested, fascinated, and returns to the path 
of sobriety. He feels now that he has achieved a victory, 
and is gratified at his success. He fears no future evil, 
and reposes in conscious security. He retains his old 
companions, participates in their former amusements, and 
imperceptibly glides into "their old habits. It is the im- 
perceptible progress of the current that draws the vessel 
to the gulf, and the victim of intemperance has traveled a 
bowshot beyond the point at which he was arrested by 

3 



l8 AUTOBIOGRAPHY 

that Still small voice. That voice now speaks in thunder 
tones, alarming his worst fears; and it requires a convul- 
sive effort to save him from the gulf that yawns to receive 
him. He makes the effort, and is redeemed. But if he 
should again forget the loveliness of virtue, the charms of 
sobriety, the solicitations of friends; if he should again 
Hsten to the Syren song oi pleasure, it will be like the 
third and last flight of the Patriarch's dove, for he who 
takes it returns no more. 

During Mr. Hayes' sobriety, which lasted a few months, 
I became well acquainted with him, and my admiration of 
his genius increased with tne acquaintance. During this 
period he believed he had discovered a "perpetual mo- 
tion." The thought intoxicated him, and whisky kept 
up the delusion until death shrouded him in darkness. His 
genius, his intellection, doubtless returned to its source, 
and is bathing in the flood of light which it was vainly 
seeking in this sublunary world. 

Bardstown was famous for its schools and colleges, Prot- 
estant and Roman Catholic ; the latter were presided over 
by Bishops Flaget and David, eminent for their piety and 
ability. Of late years the Rev. Crosby has presided over 
the Protestant high school, with learning, ability and emi- 
nent piety. Apollo, the God of poesy, has had many vo- 
taries here; chief among them was Dr. Harney, author of 
"Christilina," a Fairy Tale, and of "Fever Dream," a 
poem resembling Byron's Darkness, and commencing 
thus: "A fever fired my brain, scorched my body and 
burned within the gloomy caverns of my heart ; 1 asked 
for one cold, clear draft of fountain water ; 'twas with 



OF THE AUTHOR. 19 

tears denied. I drank my nauseous febrifuge and slept, 
but rested not ; I dreamed of forests on fire, the earth 
parched with fervid heat, the inhabitants fleeing to the 
mountains pursuing a flying cloud, and crying water." 
Peter Grayson, John E. Hardin and other worshipers of 
the tragic muse poured out melodious verse to Melpomene. 
The air of Bardstown was inspiring, and the groves and 
grottoes filled with sylvan deities. Under these conjoint 
influences I wrote the following elegiac valedictory to a fe- 
male friend, in whose society my head had been enlightened 
and my heart purified. Although fifty years have elapsed 
smce it was written, and I retained no record, not a 
thought or a word has been erased from my memory. 
It is a part of that Hfe which will live forever : 

VALEDICTORY. 

"Lean not on earth, t'will pierce to the heart; a broken 
reed at best, but oft a spear ; on its sharp point peace 
bleeds and hope expires. " We listen with a holy interest 
to the accents of a dying friend, and treasure up his words 
as an intellectual legacy, which his life has enabled him 
to accumulate. May not he then who takes leave of his 
friend, perhaps forever, hope to excite an equal interest ? 
In the first instance there is a death to hope ; 
and despair with wmgs of sable hue oversweeps the 
grave. In the second instance, hope sustams us in the 
parting hour, and busy fancy travels through days, months 
or years and brings around the happy period when doubt 
with all her gloomy train will be swept away, and hope 
lost m fruition. 

I have not the vanity to believe that any opinions I 



20 AUTOBIOGRAPHY 

have entertained or any feelings I have cherished, will ex- 
cite sufficient interest to be classed with those sacred rel- 
ics that are wrung from our hearts by Fate and hallowed 
by time. I have respected virtue, admired talent, ven- 
erated age, and have worshipped female loveliness with 
an eastern idolatry. I commenced my life of manhood 
with more flattering prospects than seem now to await 
me. I entered with great zeal upon the path to fame, and 
determined to tread the circle of science. I vainly im- 
aged there were no difficulties I could not surmount, no 
complexities I could not unfold, no magnitude of subject 
I could not grasp. I contended successfully without 
much effort with the foremost in the lists, and fancied I 
was rapidly approaching the goal of my ambition. Dis- 
ease arrested my progress in the acquisition of science? 
and that spirit which has disdained all fetters, indulged 
without control the wild vagaries of an undisciplined im- 
agination and the warm impulses of an unsuspectuig 
heart ; like a misanthrope who having become disgusted 
with society abjures its trammels and wanders in the 
fields of nature hoping to find there some solace for his 
afflictions. 

I sought refuge in love, and loved with an ardor which 
difficulties inflamed and opposition infuriated. But who 
was she in whose presence my heart ceased to throb and 
my pulse stood still ? She was not a creature of the brain 
which my imagination embodied in a human form ; not 
the imagined ideal of novelists, and poets, not the beauti- 
ful prototype of that enthusiast who wrought in Parian 
marble the statue that enchants the world. She was a 



OF THE AUTHOR. 21 

fair daughter of nature, with Attic forehead and Phidian 
nose ; she was white as the snows of the Appenines, and 
destructive as the avalanche. Her wit, though Attic and 
brilHant as a flaming sword, was rendered harmless by 
that unerring judgment and that delicate sensibility for 
which she was distinguished. Her modesty was as pure as 
the unblown rose that feeds upon the morning dew, and 
the sensitive plant shrunk not sooner from the touch, than 
she n-om the rude gaze. The contemplation of her 
charms inspired those transports which Plato imagined 
the vision of virtue would inspire if virtue could be seen. 
She seemed to have been destined for another sphere, and 
not to wear this load of human clay, for here she dwelt in 
loneliness and died in sorrow. An Angel's arm could 
not rescue her from the grave; legions of Angels could not 
confine her there ; I do not wish her back in this breath- 
ing world, and yet I love her dead more than all the liv- 
ing. A long, listless calm ensued, in which I was deaf to 
the voice of friendship, the blandishments of flattery, and 
the thriUing notes of ambition. Years rolled away, 'ere I 
was induced to feel any interest in life or participate in its 
follies ; when I did, 'twas with the emotions of a traveler 
in a barbarous country who hears a savage yell in every 
hoarse murmur of the northern blast, and sees at every 
step the concealed mouth of a slumbering volcano. For 
protection against the curious gaze, and the impertinent 
enquiry, I assumed an unreal character, and after the 
fashion of the age, I laughed with the joyous, wept with 
the sorrowful, speculated with the moralist, and oh ! what 
sacrilege ! professed love ! That I have incurred the cen- 



2 2 AUTOBIOGRAPHY 

sure of the moralist is indeed most true ; that I have 
excitei the sympathy of the generous is also true; but 
that I have inflicted no unnecessary cruelty on the igno- 
rant and the credulous is a consolatory reflection I shall 
not lose when all earthly resources shall be swept away. 
When for me the world shall present no inducement and 
hope, no promise ; when the generous shall cease to sym- 
pathize and the malignant to persecute, then will this con- 
sciousness sustain me in the midst of ruin — a living monu- 
ment of the superiority of intellectual energy over all 
physical ills. Whatever, therefore, may be my fate; 
whether to experience the cold gripe of poverty, or to 
witness the withering frowns of an insulting multitude, or 
to listen to the discordant yells of an infuriated faction, I 
will never sever the tie that binds me to my buried love; I 
will never erase from my memory an object so dear to my 
heart. I have experienced the pleasure that intoxicates, 
the love that infuriates, and the ambition that desolates ; 
I would not exchange my buried love for a thousand liv- 
ing ones. Misfortunes are crucibles in which great minds 
are refined and in which weak ones evaporate. We dive 
for precious pearls in sorrow's stream. 

Confucius, the Chinese Philosopher, died of disappoint- 
ment and sorrow, and yet his simple life stamped itself upon 
his people more than all the conquests of Kings and Em- 
perors since. Luther had his soHtary years of struggles, 
and passed through fiery trials and persecutions. Moses 
was sad among the slaves of Egypt ; Tasso's grief drove 
iiim into prison which was illuminated by the light of his 
genius Cowper's lamentation addressed to his mother's 



OF THE AUTHOR. 23 

picture will live as long as the language in which it is 
written. Dante's love of Beatrice tortured him through 
life ; it was the source of his sublimest thoughts and of his 
purest afifections ; He who spake as never man spake, was 
a man ot sorrows. If sorrow is the great purifier, let not 
man complain. Complaint is the language of weakness ; 
submission is wisdom. I had almost forgotten I was bid- 
ding adieu to my friend, perhaps forever ; I was contem- 
plating the gloominess of my fortunes and the dark clouds 
of Fate hung heavy around me ; but she appears not as 
my imagination could conceive her, leaning from a cloud, 
her dark hair streaming in the wind and her arms white 
as the foam of waters extended to receive me ; not as an 
Angel of pity touched with tenderness at the sight of hu- 
man agony, descends to soothe the aching heart, but as a 
child of h imanity, in beautiful simplicity offering to her 
friend the consolation of sympathy. Oh friendship, how 
pure, and sympathy how divine ; who would lose, though 
full of pains, this intellectual being ! those feelings that shine 
with the Hght of Heaven, and those thoughts that wander 
through eternity. Farewell, a word that was once breathed 
in tones of despair by our primeval Father when taking 
a longing, lingering look at his lost Eden. Farewell, was 
whispered by Helen, the peerless prize of beauty when 
bidding adieu to her Lord, her country and her Gods. 
Farewell was muttered in wrath by the brightest Arch- 
angel that ever left the Throne of the Eternal, to 
dwell in adamantine chains and penal fires. Farewell has 
been spoken by the young, the beautiful and the brave in 



24 AUTOBIOGRAPHY 



every age ; to fame, to country and to fortune: It has been 
reserved for me alone to say farewell to hope. 

Through an uncle residing in Kentucky, a warm per- 
sonal and political friend of General Jackson, I received 
an invitation to visit him, at the Hermitage, which 1 ac- 
cepted in 1827. My Uncle had published a pamphlet 
entitled Philo Jackson, advocating his election to the 
Presidency, which was distributed in almost every State 
in the Union, It was written with much vigor, and doubt- 
less had a decided effect. The General's gratitude to my 
Uncle was manifested by repeated acts of kindness to me. 
Through his influence direct, and indirect, I was retained 
in public oflice seven years. Whatever the General's 
vices may have been, mgratitude was not one of them. I 
remained at the Hermitage two weeks. The family con- 
sisted of the General, Aunt Rachel, Andrew Jackson 
Donaldson, the nephew of Mrs. Jackson, the overseer 
and the servants, all discharging their various duties with 
fidelity and cheerfulness. The General was affectionate 
to his family, scrupulously polite to his guests, and kind, 
to all. The family lived plainly, but very coinforcably. 
There was very little formality or ceremony, and every vis- 
itor felt himself at home. I was frequently with him in 
the cotton field while his servants were gathering the 
crop, and they seemed to be in no dread of 
the iron man, as his enemies called him. 
In truth his government was patriarchal, and his 
subjects loved him. He said to me every body 
at home governed him — wife, overseer and servants. He 
spoke freely of men and things, of his enemies with bit- 



OF THE AUTHOR. 25 

terness. He gave me the history of his military life, of 
the privations, hardships, and the dangers to which he 
had been exposed, and of the cruel manner in which 
political demagogues had misrepresented his motives and 
conduct. His chief consolation was in the consciousness 
of having discharged his duty to his country. He spoke 
particularly of the misrepresentations of a letter he had 
addressed to President Monroe in regard to the formation 
of his Cabinet. It seems that Mr. Monroe consulted him 
on the subject, and the General in reply said, "Ask but 
two questions in regard to the individual you propose to 
appoint, to wit : Is he capable ? is he honest ? without 
regard to party." The charge was that he had advised 
President Monroe to appoint his Cabinet out of the two 
great parties, whereas he said without regard to party. 
He said he was at a loss to account for the manner in 
which that private letter became public. I told him that 
I had heard in Virginia that Mr. Monroe consulted Judge 
Roane of Virginia, upon all political subjects, and sent 
him many of his private letters. After the death of Judge 
Roane these letters fell into the hands of his son William 
H. Roane, who being bitterly opposed to General Jack- 
son's election to the Presidency, forwarded that letter to 
Washington to be used against him. He said it was the 
first time he had heard the history of that letter. During 
my stay at the Hermitage I became satisfied that Gen- 
eral Jackson was a very rare man ; that he had within him 
the elementary principles of a great man in an eminent 
degree, to wit : honesty of purpose, practical common 
sense, self-knowledge and self-government. I had seen 



26 AUTOBIOGRAPHY 

many men who were esteemed great, but was never so 
impressed by the character of any man. 

I remained two years longer in Kentucky, reading and 
practicing law, and then proceeded to Bedford, Indiatia, 
expecting to make it my future home. The second year 
ot my residence at Bedford I became a candidate for the 
legislative assembly, and was elected ; during the session 
of the legislature General Jarkson's proclamation on the 
subject of the South Carolina nullification was issued, 
which agitated the country from the centre to the cir- 
cuinterence. I was the author of the Indiana resolutions 
approving of that proclamation, which were passed in the 
Assembly with but ten dissenting v<iices, and by the Sen- 
ate almost unanimously. The next year I was appointed 
register ot the land office at Indianapolis by General 
Jackson, and the year following transferred to the land 
office at Green Bay, then in Michigan territory. In 
December, 1835, ^ ^^^^ elected a member of the legisla- 
tive council of Michigan, which met at Green Bay in 
January, 1836. I was the author of the memorial to 
Congress requesting the establishment of the territory of 
Wisconsin, to embrace the government lands west of Lake 
Michigan. The act of organization went into etfect on 
the Fourth of July, 1836. In February, 1837, I was 
appointed by General Jackson, Secretary of the Territory 
of Wisconsm for four years. At the close of my official 
term as Secretary I retiied to my farm near Madison, ana 
was no more in public life until appointed by President 
I-incoln Commissary of Subsistence, in 1863, and in 1864 
Quarter Master, and was stationed at Jefferson Barracks, 



OF THE AUTHOR. 27 

Missouri. In the fall of 1864 I resigned both of these 
offices, and since then have remained in private Hfe. I 
was occupied in 1875-6 in writing biographical sketches 
of the eminent and self-made men of Wisconsin for the 
American Biographical Publishing Company. 

The following upon CiviHzation, is one of the many 
lectures I have delivered in public : 

Civilization is a very comprehensive subject ; it com- 
prehends man, and man is the Universe in miniature. He 
combines in his physique the animal, vegetable and min- 
eral kingdoms. He has all the faculties of sense in com- 
mon with the brutes. He has mind, a soul, a spiritual 
essence emanating from Deity, eternal with its source. 
In man (says Professor Stallo) all the powers of the Uni- 
verse are concentrated, all developments united, all forms 
associated. There is no tone to which his being is not the 
response ; there is no form of which he is not the type. A 
subject thus comprehensive, embracing all the laws of the 
Universe, cannot be fully comprehended by a finite mind. 
It requires the intelligence of a disembodied spirit, look- 
ing back upon the past eternity, and forward into the fu- 
ture, to comprehend it in its magnitude and its minuteness. 
A few illustrations of its phases may stimulate us to fur- 
ther inquiry and to new developments in our efforts to 
attain a higher civilization. Science itself is not the ex- 
plainer of laws, but the observer of phenomena ; and the 
phenomena of man's social condition, is the history of his 
civilization. 

The best mode of acquiring knowledge on this subject 
is by the study of biography. Biography is not only the 
written life of an individual, it is also a record of human 
character ; in the hands of a skillful artist, it is a Uving 
image. This idea was doubdess present to the mind of 
Dr. Johnson when he said to Boswell, "if you write my 
life, I will take yours." His self knowledge made his own 
life almost unendurable, hence his long continued fits of 



28 AUTOBIOGRAPHY 

gloom, and dread of death. He presumed if known to 
the world it would be equally repulsive. 

The value of history depends upon the truth of biog- 
raphy, for history is an aggregation of biographies. He 
who understands one man thoroughly, understands all 
men. The essential elements are the same. There is in 
them unvarying unity. In their manifestations there is 
endless variety. Previous to presenting to you illustra- 
tions of Civilization, I would inquire into the origin and 
progress of animal and vegetable life, and with this view 
I would ask what is life? Physiologists define life to be 
action. Life is more, it is progress ; it is still more, it is 
eternal. The principle of life is undying ; though the 
flowers perish, it still lives in the successsve progeny of 
bloom. 

The grave-stones of the dead are the stepping-stones of 
the living. There is, however, no unlimited progress for 
any form of life, and the philosopher must bear in mind 
that the two principles of life and death are inseparably 
linked together in the mystic chain of universal being, as 
are the principles of mind and matter — both indestructable, 
both eternal. It seems to be a universal law of progress, 
that from death and decay there shall arise new and more 
glorious forms of life. The world teems with illustrations 
of this great truth: Look and you will see it written in a 
thousand characters ; listen and you will hear it spoken by 
a thousand tongues. You will discover among the arch- 
ives of the old primeval earth the first faint beginnings of 
organic existence — life as a thing of motion and sensibility 
scarcely pulsated in the vegetable animal. This crude 
creation was the sole tenant of the boundless solitude. A 
mighty convulsion of the planet buries its feeble popula- 
tion in one vast grave; this universal death leads to a 
higher manifestation of life. Another convulsion of the 
planet ensues. Another baptism of fire or of flood — and 
lo ! life bursting forth as it were from the sepulchres of the 
past, clothes itself in higher forms of creative energy; and 
so through the cycling ages, death has followed hard 
upon life, destroying one structure of animated being tliat 



OF THE AUTHOR. ig 

it might be replaced by a higher type, until the grand 
series of creation was perfected in man. Give a tongue 
then to the grand prodigies which are registered in the 
rocky archives of the past, and they will with one voice 
exclaim, death is progress. And so it may be affirmed of 
the various social, moral and philosophical systems 
which have lived their day and died ; some of them with- 
out the inspiration of a pure and lofty ideal, have quietly 
expired in their dotage ; others again have fallen with a 
crash and died as the lion dies, with a struggle and a 
groan. In each case humanity has been the gainer ; its 
great heart has beat with a fuller and a freer pulse ; it has 
girded itself for its mission in the world, in the strength 
of nobler purposes, and a truer manhood. Cast your eye 
through the long vista of the past, and upon those grave- 
stones which have been set up all along the pathv/ay of 
human progress, you could write no epitaph so appropri- 
ate as the words "death is progress." If then death is 
progress, and life culminates in man, what is civilization? 
Civilization may be defined as that state or condition of 
society in which bodies of men, after passing through the 
intermediate stage of shepherds, or hunters, have pro- 
gressed to that of settled habits of life, and are living in 
social compact. Government by fixed laws, written or 
unwritten, and possessed of a certain degree of re- 
finement in the arts and social life. The 
most essential element is unselfishness, and is 
developed in that sublimest of all moral maxims, 
"do as you would be done by." Its spirit is that of a 
Christian gentleman. The basis of all civilization is sta- 
bility. Nomadic tribes leading a precarious and wander- 
ing life can never be ranked among civilized nations. Un- 
less driven for safety or comfort to aggregate themselves, 
they never develope any nearer approach to civilization, 
than is found at the present day among the pastoral tribes 
of the steppes of Siberia or among the hunter races of 
our own hemisphere. The influence of the conditions 
which surround man in his state of civilization, 
and his influence upon those conditions, have 



30 AtJTORrOGRAPHY 

been the subject of learned discussions, by theolo- 
gians, political philosophers and ethnologists. The theo- 
logians, ascribing to them a divine power, or special 
agency urging him to a higher life ; the political philoso- 
pher ascribe them to the government and laws, written or 
unwritten, under which he lives; the ethnologists to the 
characteristics of the race to which he belongs. Civil- 
ization has engaged the attention and occupied the 
minds of some of the deepest thinkers of world, in every 
stage of its development. Perhaps the most learned and 
philosop;;ical writer of the last hundred years is Henry 
Thomas Buckle, who has given to the world one of the 
most splendid productions of the human intellect, and 
one of the most valuable works ever deposited in the 
archives of human science. He, like other writers, who 
have preceded him, ascribes to climate, soil, 
productions, and the general aspects of 
nature, the chief influences m the forma- 
tion of character, and consequently of civilization. Vic- 
tor Cousin, one of the most brilliant lights that ever illu- 
minated the world of thought, said, "give me the map of 
any country, its configuration, its climate, its waters, its 
winds, its natural productions, its flora, and its zoology, 
and 1 will tell you what will be the quality of man in that 
country, and what part its inhabitants will act in history." 
A citizen of our own country in a recent work on "social 
philosophy," ascribed to Race, a paramount influence in 
the character of civilization, and asks whether a colony 
of Guinea negroes cantoned ujJon the Alps for a thousand 
years, would exhibit the same state of society we now 
find among the hardy, intelligent, and virtuous Switzers ? 
Whether they would have built the city of Geneva, and 
be now making the finest chronometers in the world ? 
Adam Smith ascribes to climate alone all the variety of 
the human complexion, and says "the Jew is white in 
England, swarthy in Spain, olive in Portugal, and black 
in Africa. The learned, the eloquent, the philosophical 
Mirabeau, on a visit to St. Petersburg during the reign of 



OF THE AtTTHOR. 3I 

the great Catharine, observing the influence of physical 
causes in the formation of character, said : 

"The Russian, hunger, thirst, fatigue subdues ; 

His foe across each desert wild pursues. 

Dares adverse fortune, dares impending fate ; 

And prodigal of life is bravely great ; 

Humble, though proud, his banner wide unfurled, 

Guide but his arm, he'll subjugate the world." 

The ancient classics furnish some striking instances 
illustrating character as ctejjendant upon food. /Escu- 
lapius devoted his life to the promotion of human happi- 
ness ; and in studying the remedies for human ills acquired 
the title of God of Medicine. After his death divine 
honors were paid to his memory. He was a pupil of 
Chiron the Centaur, who taught the poHte arts to the 
greatest heroes of the age, among them ^^sculapius and 
^^neas, Hercule.s, and Achilles. For the two f Tmer he 
prescribed a milk diet, for the two latter the marrow of 
wild beasts — hence the benevolence of ^■Esculapius, and 
in bearing his father Anchises upon his shoulders from 
the flames of Troy, we read of the pious ^ilneas ; what 
but the marrow of wild beasts enabled Hercules to cleanse 
the Augean stable? To strangle in his grasp the N^- 
mean Hon; to kill with his club the Laernean Hydra with 
his hundred heads, or descending to the Infernal regions, 
drag Cerberus from the gates of hell? What but the mar- 
row of wild beasts could have awakened iji Achilles that 
wrath to "Greece the direful spring of woes unnumbered." 
That wrath which bound the slain Hector to his chariot 
wheels and dragged him three times round the tomb ol 
Patroclus ; that wrath which envied m anticipation the 
repast of the dogs and the vultures upon the mangled 
corpse. The self-complacency, and the sturdy independ- 
ence of the Englishman is ascribed to his foggy atmos- 
phere, to his roast-beef, and to his ale ; the vivacity of the 
Frenchman to his sunny clime, and to the sparklmg v/ines 
from his vine-clad hills ; the gentleness of the Hindoo^ to 
his balmy air, and to his milk and vegetable food, and 
the ferocity of the Carribee, to his cannibahsm. Poli- 
ticians, not Philosophers, have ascribed to slavery an im 



32 AUTOBIOGRAPHY 

portant agency in the formation of character, as well as a 
disturbing element in our Governmental institutions. But 
slavery has no magic power to form character, or build 
up institutions. It is a means of wealth, and leads to the 
same results as other wealth. There is slavery wherever 
there is wealth and power. All involuntary service is 
slavery. We are all the slaves of circumstances which we 
can neither foresee nor prevent ; necessity is as stern a 
task-master as the negro- driver on the southern planta- 
tion. Until cotton became King, slavery gave no wealth, 
wealth no luxury, luxury no love of ease, for the 
gratification of which energy foregoes her exertions, 
science closes her volumes, all aspirations slum- 
ber, a dreamy inactivity ensues, which deprives the 
limb of its vigor, and the soul of its fire. When JuHus 
Csesar wooed glory, he abandoned his life of foppery, the 
table of luxury and the bed of ease; he sought the tented, 
field, with its privations, its toils, and its dangers. The 
love of ease in the lap of love, lost Mark Anthony the 
world. Ambition may be gratified, the gambler may 
reform, the inebriate abandon his cups, but the love of 
ease when it once takes full possession of the soul, rises 
like Pelion upon Ossa, above every other passion, and 
like Juggernaut immolates all that is noble in man, beau- 
tiful in woman and pure in religion Beware of its Cir- 
cean spell. There have been individual instances, in 
which the seductive influence of a luxurious climate in 
conjunction with the love of ease have paralyzed 
the noblest faculties of the mind, and lulled 
to repose the energies of the body. In illustration 
of which I will present to you a slight sketch of a remark- 
able genius, who a few years ago shot star-like across the 
literary sky with a strange and meteoric splendor, and 
who required only self-reliance as a motive power to have 
made him a Byron, or a Bulwer. The love of ease cov- 
ered him all over, like Sancho Panza's cloak, and a mine 
of wealth richer than that of Golconda, was lost to the 
world. He had received in early youth from distin- 
guished masters an education, broad, deep and profound. 



OF THE AUTHOR. 33 

Endorsed by nature with extraordinary capabilities, his 
ambition could be gratified only with supremacy, hence 
his devotion to his studies, which continued with unabated 
zeal during his long, and with one exception uneventful 
life. He stepped upon the public theater of life panoplied 
like Minerva from the brain of Jupiter, prepared to assail 
or to defend against all opposition. He had dived deep 
into the arcana of nature, and traced out those laws which 
govern the material as well as the immaterial worlds. As- 
tronomy unfolded her beautiful galaxy to his enraptured 
gaze ; geology opened up the earth to display her gems 
hid since the foundations of the earth were laid ; philos- 
ophy, history poetry, sculpture, painting and the kindred 
arts, were familiar to him as household words . A learned 
jurist, an eloquent advocate, and in defence of injured 
innocence his soul filled with holy indignation, and his 
lips were touched with a coal from the altar of Heaven. 
Although in the world, he was not of the world, and held 
but slight communion with his fellow men. His converse 
was with the mighty dead who have "left their footprints 
on the sands of time.." Solitude was his stern friend, and 
plumed the wings that bore his genius further than suns 
and stars. I remember as an humble pilgrim to the shrine 
of genius to have visited his classic home, embowered 
amid the evergreen cedar and the waving pine, drinking 
deep draughts of wisdom and of ancient lore, as they 
flowed from his eloquent lips. I remember how all nature 
wore an aspect of freshness as if watered by Castalian 
dews, as we wandered over its grassy plains, climbed its 
steep hills or rested in its shady groves. 1 well remem- 
ber how with horse and horn and hound we chased the 
fleet deer through bush and briar, and brake, to the deep 
mouthed music of Stormer, and Trooper, and Singwell, 
and Clio, stag hounds of black St. Hubert's breed. Many 
a time and oft, in the still watches of the wintry night, 
while gazing upon the radiant Queen of hght floating in 
the deep blue, I have listened to the notes of the indomi- 
table old Stormer sounding through the leafy arcade like a 
muffled drum, as he slowly and steadily tracked the 



34 AUTOBIOGRAPHY 

Stealthy deer through his devious windings to his lair ; but 
when the quick, sharp notes of Trooper, like a volley of 
musketry, came hustling upon the booming air, we knew 
that the game was up, and that the antlered monarch of 
the waste had lef this heathery couch in haste ; and then 
and there was mounting in not haste, as wild and high 
rose the glad notes of the chase, while Singwell's silver 
tones chimed with CHo's reedy song. All of which have 
passed away like the pathos of a pleasing dream, or the 
viewless spirit of a sound. The climate, soil and produc- 
tions of our own country,are not sufficiently varied to con- 
stitute any essential difference in our civilization. If there 
are shades of difference, they so resemble the blended beau- 
ties of the rainbow, that it is impossible for the most acute 
vision to mark the termination of one shade and the com- 
mencement of another. If George Washington was the 
Father of his country,, we are all alike his children ; if 
Thomas Jefferson was the author of the Declaration of 
Independence, John Hancock, John Adams, and Roger 
Sherman affixed to it their signatures with the halters 
around their necks. If George Mason was the author of 
the bill of rights ; Benjamin Franklin, Samuel Adams and 
Stephen Hopkins pledged their lives, their fortunes, and 
their sacred honor to maintain them. If Patrick Henry 
set the revolutionary ball in motion, John Adams gave it 
impetus with the fervor of his eloquence. If Richard 
Henry Lee was the Southern Cicero, Fisher Ames was 
the Northern Demosthenes — if there was in the South a 
Chief Justice Marshall whose genius unlike that of all 
other men, knew no rising and no setting, but was one 
continuous blaze of light from the commencement to the 
termination of his long judicial career, there was a Jus- 
tice Story in the North, his co-equal in learning". If 
John C. Calhoun was the distinguished statesman of the 
South ; Daniel Webster of the North, was the great ex- 
pounder of the constitutional law. These men and their 
contemporaries were the outgrowth of the throes and con- 
vulsions of revolution, that made us a nation. Heroes 
like mountains are made by convulsions. These men 



OF THE AUTHOR. 35 

were majestic in their great abilities, sublime in their 
immaculate virtues, beautiful in their private lives, and 
may be safely held up to the world as models of that 
purity of life and conduct — that stern inflexible patriot- 
ism, and that determined valor which have thrown a 
dazzling, an almost overwhelming lustre over the names of 
Epamonondas, of Brutus and of Scipio. Among those 
illustrious men who were the pride of their country and 
ornaments to human nature, there was one who stood 
pre-eminent, who surpassed all his contemporaries, 
and who eclipsed every Greek and Roman upon record. 
No intuitions of genius flashed upon his mind, no ebul- 
litions of passion controlled his conduct. Wise in council, 
serene in battle, no emergences disconcerted him, no 
dangers appalled him. Whatever knowledge he pos- 
sessed was acquired by close, steady and profound 
thought ; his self-knowledge gave him knowledge of others; 
his self-government enabled him to govern others. With 
unerring judgment, with intelligent patriotism, with incor- 
ruptible integrity, he met all subjects submitted for his 
consideration,and with the calmness of repose disposed of 
them in accordance with truth and justice. His was pre- 
eminently the genius of character, which is as far supe- 
rior to the genius of intellect as the invigorating rays of 
the sun are superior to the scintillations of the stars. 
Genius of character commended Moses to his God and 
gave him authority over men. Genius of character 
enabled Confucius to stamp himself indehbly upon three 
hundred millions of people, for more than two 
thousand, five hundred years. To Wash- 
ington's genius of character the country is 
indebted for its independence, and the world for the 
highest type of christian civilization that has appeared in 
this or any other age. In the presence of George Wash- 
ington, the boasted heroes of antiquity dwindled into in- 
significance, and he stands alone upon the rolls of fame 
without a parallel, like some tall pillar in a desert land in 
majestic loneliness, upon which the mind reposes with awe 
and admiration, while all around is gloom, and solitude, 



36 AUTOBIOGRAPHY 

and silence. Of the monuments that have been erected 
to the memory of those great actors in the drama of hu- 
man hfe, it may be as it has been inimitably said of the 
immortal Shakspeare. The stream of time which is con- 
tinually washing away the dissoluble fabrics of other poets, 
passes without injury by the adamant of Shakspeare. 
God's gifts are peculiar to no peoples, age or clime, and of 
the benighted Hotentot we may in the language of nature 
ask: 

"Is he not man though science never shed 

Her quick'ning beams on his neglected head ; 

Is he not man by sin and suffering tried? 

Is he not man for whom a Savior died?" 

Genius is peculiar to no race, and hence the most dis- 
tinguished dramatic writer ot his day was a slave of 
African birth. His style is so simple, so beautiful, so 
natural, that in reading his plays you almost imagine you 
are conversing with the ancient Romans. Freedom of 
mind, however, is necessary to the achievements of mind 
and to the honor of freedom. Terence never wrote a play 
until he was a free man and a Roman citizen. 

In turning our attention to the Northern portion of our 
country, for the character of its civilization, the mind is 
almost overwhelmed with the variety of its exhibitions. 
Science which for ages was to the public a 
sealed book, confined to the cloisters, and to the acade- 
mies, has been rendered popular and practical, and spread 
broadcast over the land, awakening thought and stimu- 
lating inquiry. The avenues to wealth and fame are open 
to every aspirant, and the son of free-labor taught self- 
reliance from his infancy, enters upon his career with a 
zeal that knows no relaxation, and an energy that knows 
no failure. Heraldic fame, which gives caste in other 
countries, is regarded as a myth by the architect of his 
own fortunes, and wealth, which creates factitious distinc- 
tion elsewhere is regarded only as a means to success. We 
see the impress of free labor upon the interminable forests 
and fhe boundless prairies, once the abode of savage life 
where the demoniac yell and the war whoop were the in- 



OF THE AUTHOR. 37 

spiriting notes to cruelty and horror, now the home of 
civihzation where every Sabbath morn and eve the 
Church bell is heard spreading its fine music over the 
beautiful landscapes of nature summoning the rustic wor- 
shippers to the temple of their God. 

For the purposes of commerce lakes have become in- 
land seas, with their centers of trade, their light houses 
and their harbors. Rivers and canals are the highways 
to the public marts ; schools, colleges and churches, 
the sentinels to guard tlie public morals. With a 
climate pure, bracing, and healthy, a soil rich as the 
Egyptian Delta, it requires no prophetic vision to see in 
the near future, a hundred miUions of enterprising people 
inhabiting our vast domains, making the solitary places 
glad and the wilderness to blossom as the rose. What 
shore does not already bear the stamp of their footsteps? 
What boundary in the regions of intellect has yet satis- 
fied their ardor of progress? Dr. Johnson said the Amer- 
icans were "ignorant, vulgar, sensual, and prolific as their 
own rattlesnakes. That they were destitute of literary 
taste." He was told that the Rambler was read m Amer- 
ica, when the sting of his reproach was extracted in the 
expression of his surprise. The refinements of a high 
civilization are the growth of centuries, towards which 
America is progressing with rapid strides. It is less 
fashionable now than formerly, for British tourists to dep- 
recate American morals and manners. Al- 
though the sons of America have not 
sung in Homeric verse, nor carved the chiseled beauties 
of Phidias, nor caught the delicate tints of Titian, they 
have successfully rivalled, and, in the useful arts excelled, 
the artists of the European world. The dibtinguished 
achievements of individuals, and the remarkable epoche 
of nations, have heretofore occurred at long intervals in 
the world's history. Of late years discovery has quick- 
ened thought, thought action, until Fulton's steam has 
bridged the Atlantic, and the winged car flies from ocean 
to ocean. Franklin drew electric fire from Heaven, and 
Morse has transmitted intelligence upon its wings to the 



38 AUTOBIOGRAPHY 

mosl distant civilizations ; and the lightning, submissive 
to man's will, and charged with his commands, encircles 
the globe in a moment of time. Whitney's cotton gin 
gave to the broad Savannahs of the south a snowy white- 
ness, which has been all crimsoned with fraternal blood. 
Howe's lock-stitch has taken pallor from the cheek and 
care from the heart of the woman who was enslaved by 
her needle, and restored to her health and beauty, and 
happiness. Powers, in introducing Eve to the present 
generation, has given to marble his beau-ideal of female 
loveliness, and perpetuated the odium of tyranny in his 
Greek slave. Henry Clay still lives in the sculptured 
marble of Hart in his beloved Kentucky, and his admir- 
ing countrymen hnger around the historic monument to 
catch the inspiration of his genius. Shall we take you to 
the battle-tield and there see the sons of our common 
country cut down with the missiles of death which Amer- 
ican invention has rendered more destructive than the 
mind of man ever before conceived ? The ground is cov 
ered with the wounded, the dying and the dead , the air 
resounds with their shrieks and their groans ; when Mor- 
ton, the discoverer of the wonderful lethean, with the 
army corps of surgeons approaches. Ether is adminis- 
tered, and all is hushed ; not in the stillness of death, but 
in the silence of sleep; a sleep so profound that nothng 
less than that voice which said Lazarus come forth, can 
reach their deafened ears. Oblivion shrouds their senses, 
while their immortal spirits visit their homes and their 
"dear native bovvers, where pleasures awaited on life's 
merry morn, while memory strod sideways, half covered 
with flowers, disclosing each rose, but secreting the thorn. " 
If a father, he is with his children all at play. He, their 
sire, butchered in fratricidal fray. If a son, he is with 
his Roman mother who gave her only jewel to her coun- 
try. If a lover he is in the bower of love, crowned with 
laurel by the hand he loves. Shall we take you to the 
laboratory of the American chemist, and there show you 
scenes less harrowing to the feelings? We see him 'de- 
manding of invisible laws a formula, and extorting from 



OF THE AUTHOR. 39 

universal nature her hidden arcana. Do our senses de- 
ceive us, or is he a magician who shows us that ice can 
be formed in red-hot crucibles, and in the production of 
akuninum, that the unheeded clod at our feet contains a 
metal more precious than silver, can be fashicmed into 
exquisite works of art, ornaments for the queenly diadem 
or the neck of beauty, or by spectral analysis, discover- 
ing beautiful metals in sea-water, never before conceived 
in the dreams of the Alchemist not gold, nor silver, but 
far more beautiful than either. Or shall we see him hand- 
ling the rays of the sun in the chrystalization of the salts 
of silver, reproducing nature in her perfect forms, bidding 
the sun to limn for him the objects that he illummes by 
means of the daguerreotype and the photograph. Or 
shall we see him again in the condensation of carbonic 
acid, controlling by the magic power of mind an expan- 
sive power sixteen times greater than that of steam. 

"Then harness me down with your iron bands, 

Be sure of your curb and your rein ; 
I scorn the power of your puny hands, 

As the tempest scorns a chain." 

Time would fail me to enumerate the statesmen, 
philosophers, orators, poets, historians, the eminent men 
m all the learned professions. North and South, forming a 
constellation as brilliant as any in ancient or modern 
times. The historic muse of Irving, Prescott, Bryant, and 
iMottley, has made Spain, Peru, the Netherlands, familiar 
as our own America. Bryant, Longfellow, Whittier, and 
Prentice, have charmed us with the melody of their verse 
Edward Dwight, Marsh, and Hopkins have explored the 
depths of metaphysical lore, and brought up gems of rare 
lustre and beauty. The analytic power of Johnathan 
Edwards, ranks him in tl e literary world, with Stuart 
and Reid, Locke and Hume, Hobbs and Liebnitz.. 

In natural science Silliman, Dana, Hitchcock and 
Hall are inferior only to Agassiz whom by the law of natur- 
alization, we claim as an American. His discoveries in 
North and South America have acquired for him a fame 
as enduring as the science he teaches. In paintmg. 



40 AUTOBIOGRAPHY 

West's Christ Rejected, reminds us of the wrath to come, 
in Cole's Voyage of Life, we see the shoals and the quick- 
sands we have escaped in the past, and are guided by the 
star of Hope in the future. In contemplating Church's 
Heart of the Andes, we seem to stand upon the margin 
of a miniature lake, placid as an infant's sleep, in which are 
reflected the grandeur of the mountain heights with their 
snow-covered summits, the luxuriant richness of the 
foliage, the gorgeous beauty of the flowers, the brilliant 
plumage of the birds, rendering the scene sublimely grand 
and beautifully sublime, beyond the power of description. 
While musing on this picture with silent joy, your atten- 
tion is attracted by a white speck resting upon a bare 
limb twenty thousand feet above you, overhanging the 
tremendous gorge beneath it : that white speck is the 
great, white, solitary Condor of the Andes ; the King of 
birds, the terror of all animated beings. Men, horses, 
and cattle, have been borne in his talons to his aerie with- 
out impeding his flight. We can readily imagine how 
from such a constellation of genius, learning, art and 
science, there should arise a star of peculiar magnitude 
and briUiancy; a sort of central sun, to give heat and 
life, and light ; that this central sun should embody their 
characteristic types. Learned in every science, skilled in 
every art, eloquent on every theme, adorned with all the 
accomplishments of ancient and modern lore, sustained 
solely by the love of truth, he ascends the Andean heights 
of intellectual and moral excellence, and breathes an at- 
mosphere pure as the icicle that hangs on Dian's temple, 
or the snOw that's wafted from Chimborazo's lofty peak, 
whence descend his oracles of wisdom to enHghten and 
bless mankind; for his philanthropy is co -extensive with 
his race ; and whether shivering in Novazembla's cold, or 
sweltering under a tropical sun, or writhing under the 
galling cham of slavery, there is a responsive chord in his 
heart to their every sigh of sorrow, their every pang of 
grief When this typical characteristic embodiment shall 
emancipate his countrymen from all sectarian bigotry, 
all political intolerance, all prejudice of caste ; when he 



OF THE AUTHOR. 4I 

shall have educated them up to the full measure of man- 
hood, we shall have a free, united and prosperous 
country. The canvass of our commerce will whiten- 
every shore, and the fertility of our commodities enrich 
every clime. The flag of our national honor will wave in 
every port, and the thunder of our national marine will 
proclaim the independence and the freedom of America 
as far as waters roll, and as winds can waft them. 

On the Centennial Fourth of July, I delivered at Mid- 

dleton, Wisconsin, an oration, as follows : 

Friends atid Neig^hbors — Men and Women : — I cannot 
find in the oldest book in the world — the good book — 
anythmg said about gentlemen and ladies. God made 
man and woman. Fashion made gentlemen and ladies. 
The former were made for duties, the latter for show. 
Let us, on this Centennial day, discharge our duties as 
men and women, first in gratitude to our Heavenly 
Father, for his unnumbered blessings, and secondly, in 
grateful remembrance of our forefathers, who this day 
one hundred years ago. in Congress assembled, appeal- 
ing to the Supreme Judge of the World for the rectitude 
of their intentions, declared that these United Colonies, 
were and of right ought to be free, and independent 
states. 

This is the most remarkable occasion in the world's 
history. It is the first time that 40,000,000 of freemen 
have assembled to commemorate the hundredth anniver- 
sary of their freedom. To do justice to the subject re- 
quires great ability, intimate knowledge of man, extensive 
learning, concentrated thought, and high oratorical pow- 
ers, to none of which have I any just claim, and so said 
to my friend and fellovv citizen, Mr. Richard Green, when 
applied to by him, a few days ago, to address you on this 
day. I said to him farther, "I am not the man you want. 
I am no politician, while you and your committee are 
uncompromising Republicans. I have been here forty 
years, and have never been a candidate for political office. 
Least of all am I a demagogue. I cannot pay homage 



42 AUTOBIOGRAPHY 

lo ignorance, to pride, nor to the insolence of wealth 
^vith which our country abounds. If I address you, I 
must speak the truth as I understand it — the most dis- 
agreeable of all things." He replied he was in pursuit of 
truth. I consented to address you, provided I could not 
procure a substitute more competent. I applied to sev- 
eral able and accomplished speakers, but failed, and I am 
here to redeem my promise. 

Our subject to-day is man and his government. The 
necessity of government grows out of his organization, 
that incomprehensible compound of mind and matter. 
What are his characteristics, his duties and his destiny? 
A distinguished philosopher has said, "Man is the uni- 
verse in miniature ; he combines in his physique the ani- 
mal, vegetable and mineral kingdoms ; he has all the 
passions in common with the brutes ; he has a mind, a 
soul, a spiritual essence emanating from Deity, eternal 
with its source. There is no form of which he is not the 
type ; no tone to which his being is not the response." 

When seen in the jungles of the Indies, listless, motive- 
less, and mindless, you would deem him but a few degrees 
removed from the Ourang-outang. When listening to 
him in the Grecian Atheneum, explaining the laws of 
science and numbering the stars, you would deem him a 
philosopher. When, however, seen imbruing his hands 
in the blood of his fellow-man to gratify his vengeance, 
you would deem him a fiend. Again, when seen at the 
stake, a martyr to his love for his race, you would deem 
hull an angel. The essential elements of man are com- 
mon to the race; in them there are unvarying unity ; in 
their manifestations there is endless variety. How then 
shall he be governed? Self knowledge is the first requi- 
site, of which the Grecian sage said it is "the most difficult 
thing in the universe." 

The second is self-government, of which the Roman 
Bard said : 

"He who can his boldest wish restniia. 
Can tlo more than join Africa to Spam." 

All conceivable forms of government heretofore, have 



OF THE AUTHOR. 43 

been tried, and failed. Parental, patriarchal, monarchal, 
aristocratic, imperial, and democratic. The parental was ■ 
superseded by the precocity of youth, the patriarchal 
passed away with the pastoral life, the monarchal, impe- 
rial, and aristocratic, have stained the scaffold with blood, 
and Democracy has been swallowed up in the whirlpools 
of anarchy and revolution. We are now experimenting 
with a Federal Republican Government. It is the 
outgrowth of centuries. It is the concen- 
trated thought of the statesmen of eight hundred 
years. Its essential elements are liberty and equality, the 
limitation and the division of power. It avoids consoli- 
dation on the one hand and latitudenarianism on the 
other. Its foundation rests upon human rights, its 
superstructure is designed to preserve human happiness. 
It is the standing reproach of despotic governments. It 
is the last hope of nations struggling to be free. If it shall 
prove a bauble instead of a jewel, Hope will no longer 
linger m Pandora's box. Its transcendent excellence 
consists in reserving to each individual citizen an equal 
portion of the sovereign power, a principle first 
conceived and promulgated by the Germans, after the 
downfall of the Roman Empire, about the beginning of 
the fifth century. We derive the spirit of legality 
from the Roman municipalities and laws. The spirit 
of morality, the mutual duties of men, from Chris- 
tianity ; and the spirit of liberty, the right of each individ- 
ual to himself, to the mastery of his own actions and 
destiny, to the Germans. 

This was unknown to all preceding civilizations. In 
the ancient republics, the public power governed all 
things. The individual was merged in the citizen. In 
the religious government, the individual belonged to the 
church. Man hitherto has been absorbed in the church or 
in the state. In modern Europe alone has he exerted and 
developed himself alone, on his own account, and in his 
own way, and finding in himself his aim and his right. It 
is to German thought that we owe this distinguishing 
characteristic of our civilization. The fundamental idea 



44 AUTOBIOGRAPHY 

of liberty in modern Europe, came to it from its 
conquerors. 

The framers of our Federal Republican Government 
were men of practical common sense, of profound 
thought, and were deeply conscious of their moral 
responsibilities. They were moved by lofty purposes, and 
guided by consumate skill. Therefore it is a government 
of art, the work of intellect reared upon the immutable 
basis of national right and individual happiness. 

It is also a government of experiment, and with a view 
to its permanence and respectability among the 
nations of the earth. A plain farmer, of incor- 
ruptible integrity and practical common sense, was 
elected its first President. No intuitions of 
genius flashed upon his mind, no ebulitions of 
passion controlled his conduct. Wise in council, serene 
in battle, no emergencies disconcerted him, no dangers 
appalled him. Whatever knowledge he possessed was 
acquired by close study and profound thought. His self- 
knowledge gave him knowledge of others ; his self-gov- 
ernment enabled him to govern others , with unerring 
judgment, with intelligent patriotism, with unbending 
integrity he met all subjects submitted to his consider- 
ation, and with the calmness of repose disposed of them 
in accordance with truth and justice. His was emphat 
ically the genius of character, which is as far superior to 
the genius of intellect as the irradiating beams of the sun 
are superior to the scintillations of the stars. 

Genius of character, commended Moses to his God, 
and gave him authority over men — genius of character 
enabled Confucius to stamp himself indelibly upon three 
hundred millions of people for more than two thousand 
five hundred years. To Washington's genius of character 
our country is indebted for its independence, and the 
world for the highest type of personal civilization that 
has appeared in this or any other age. While engaged 
in this great work of building up a govern- 
ment, its framers saw in magna charta extorted from 
King John 661 years ago, the germs of liberty and 



OF THE AUTHOR. 45 

equality, the limitation and the division of power. That 
instrument prohibited exclusive privileges in the fisheries ; 
it gave the subject power to dispose of a part of his 
personal estate, the remainder was divided between the 
wife and the children. It laid down the law of dower as 
it has remained ever since. It enjoined uniformity of 
weights and measures. It prohibited all denials or delays 
of justice. It brouglit the trial of issues home to the 
doors of the freeholders. It protected every individual of 
the nation in the free enjoyment of his life, of his liberty, 
and of his prosperit) . It secured the trial by jury, that 
impregnable bulwark against oppression. Hallam in his 
great work entitled the "Middle Ages," says : "Not- 
withstanding ^the important changes which time has 
wrought during the six hundred years subsequent to the 
great charter, it is still the keystone of English liberty." 
The habeas corpus came 400 years later, scarcely of less 
value than magna charta, by which the victim'of oppres 
sion is taken from the dungeon, brought before the proper 
authority and confronted with his accusers in the broad 
light of day. Two hundred years later, came the declara- 
tion of American independence, principally work of a 
Virginia farmer, and yet it contained moral power 
sufficient to agitate the thrones of despots. The last great 
work, the '■'■chef d^ ouvre^'' of those government builders, is 
the federal constitution, the embodiment of the 
principles of free government, and the charter of the 
liberties of American citizens. It should be studied and 
thoroughly comprehended by every lover of freedom. It 
should be the first pofitical lesson taught the immigrant 
who visits our shores, and the first he should instil into 
the minds of his children. Its principles are few and 
simple. They are liberty and equality; the limitation and 
the division of power, in such a manner as in the 
language of Mr. Jefferson to "bring the government to 
every man's door." These principles are plain enough 
to be comprehended by the most ordinary capacity, and 
if observed, conservative enough to have protected us 
against those convulsions which threatened to engulf us, 
and from the effects of which we are not yet free. 



4^ AUTOBIOGRAPHY 

All forms of government have had their admirers and 
supporters. A philosopher and statesman in dwelling 
upon the beauty of the reign of a patriot King, warms 
with enthusiasm until his imagination is kindled into 
poetic rapture. "What," he exclaims, "can be presented 
to the view of the mind so rare, so nearly sublime, as the 
idea of a King possessed of absolute power neither 
usurped by fraud nor maintained by force, Lut the gen- 
uine effect of confidence, of esteem and affection; a King, 
in the temper of whose reign like that of Nerva, things so 
rarely allied as empire and liberty are intimately mixed, 
co-exist together inseparably, and constitute one real 
essence." The beauty of the idea inspires those trans- 
ports which Plato imagined the vision of virtue would 
inspire if virtue could be seen. 

Patriarchal reigns, and parental authority, have doubt- 
less suggested this form of government ; and if the 
simplicity of the one, and the affection of the other had 
mmgled in royal authority, there would have been less 
objection to a King. 

Aristocracy, in common parlance is the government of 
the nobles, but in the original Greek it means the gov- 
ernment of the best, is the next common form. In this 
the power rests in the hands of a few, who are independ- 
ent of, and irresponsible to, the great body of the people, 
and hence they are influenced by no higher motive than 
self-interest, and governed by no other law than that of 
their own will. Holdmg the sword and the purse, they 
awe the rebellious into obedience, and purchase the 
aspiring with power and place. Secure from the fear of 
overthrow, with wealth to pamper their pride and their 
passions; they yield to the seductive influence of luxu- 
rious ease, and degeneracy of mind and body is the 
consequent result. They are ultimately overthrown by 
the people in their collective strength, who have borne the 
evils as long as they were endurable, or by some daring 
usurper uninfluenced by motives of philanthropy and 
untainted by luxurious effeminacy. The respective 
powers granted by the constitution of the United States 



of THE AUTHOR. 47 

to the general government and those reserved to the 
States or to the people have been the subject of angry 
discussions since the organization of the government. 

The leading doctrine of the Democratic party was and 
is, in the language of the constitution itself, "that all 
power not expressly granted to the general government is 
reserved to the states or to the people." Whereas, the 
federalists, alias the whigs, alias the Republicans, have 
been and are in favor of exercising the doubtful powers, 
as they are called, derived by construction of the constitu- 
tion, or rather by implication, and hence their adv(»cacy 
of a national bank, a tarifi" for protection, a system of 
internal improvements by the general government,t]Tie dis- 
tribution of the proceeds from the sales of the public lands, 
and other kindred measures, which were finally incorpo- 
rated in a sort of code or creed, and constituted the stan- 
dard of orthodox faith. 

For each and all of these measures there is no specific 
clause in the constitution authorizing their adoption. 
Henry Clay, the great advocate and champion and 
father of this system, in a speech in Congress, in 1811, on 
the constitutional power of Congress to establish a bank, 
said, where is this vagrant power to be found ? Some gen- 
tlemen locate it under the clause to levy and collect taxes, 
duties, imports and excises. Other gentlemen locate 
it under the clause to regulate commerce 
with foreign nations ; and others, again, under the 
clause to coin money. But, said he, the Secretary of the 
Treasury, wiser than them all, locates it under the clause 
to provide for the general welfare. 

Indignant at these various subterfuges to wrest power 
from the people, he exclaimed in tones of electric force, 
"what tyrant ever usurped a crown, who did not say he 
was providing for the general welfare! " 

Independent of the want of authority in the constitu- 
tion to establish a bank, it confers special privileges of a 
most important character; it enables a monied corporate 
body to control the finances of the nation. Monied cor- 
porate bodies have no heads to conceive schemes of 



48 AUTOBIOGRAPHY 

philanthropy, no hearts to throb in unison with human 
sympathies, cold, selfish and calculating, jealous of their 
power, and vigilant to increase it, impatient under 
restraint, and proscriptive under opposition ; in conflict 
with such institutions, whose property, whose liberty, aye, 
whose life is safe ? 

At one period in the history of the government. United 
States bank-notes constituted the only circulating mediun:. 
Its vaults were the depositories of the public moneys. Its 
President was a gentleman of high culture and position, 
of great financial ability, and knew well the power of 
money. He desired no divided empire. He held all 
other banks in tame subjection, or swept them like the 
simoon from existence. His palatial residence was the 
admiration of the lovers of art. His shrubbery and 
flowers would have excited the envy of a Shenstone. 
From his purple and gushing vineyard, he drank wine 
rivalling the old Falernian. His groves were classic 
though not ancestral, and reposing in their refreshing 
shades, he dreamed of Presidential honors. 

General Jackson, with the readiness of intuition, saw 
the concentrating forces of a dangerous power. Prophet 
like he said, "behold, there ariseth a little cloud out of 
the sea, like a man's hand." He called the attention of 
the nation to the subject of a re-charter to which he was 
opposed. When the bank, feeling itself assailed, gathered 
up its means, withdrew trom circulation one-third of its 
issues, causing panics and bankruptcies throughout the 
land, rallied all its torces and fought the administration 
with the energy of despair. The litde cloud like a man's 
hand had now overspread the land, and the elements of 
discord, were in violent commotion. The Democratic 
party paused m the conflict, but looking to the White 
House, saw their chief cool, calm, collected and firm as 
the everlasting hills, renewed the conflict with redoubled 
courage, until victory perched on their banner. The 
bank, though wounded, was not dead, and changing its 
tactics, it re-issued a much larger amount of its notes than 
it had withdrawn; finding it could not get a re-charter by 



of THE AUTHOR. 49 

oppressing the people, it would obtain one by bribery and 
corruption. 

The Democratic party then said, in the true spirit of 
the poet, " Timeo Danaios et dona ferentes." These were 
the severest trials through which the Democratic party 
ever passed, and their principles were the purer for hav- 
ing passed through the crucible ; but they had a leader 
whose inflexible firmness never faltered ; and the Demo- 
cratic party became the watchword of success. Success 
is a precipice from which the purest men and parties have 
been precipitated to destruction. It requires more moral 
courage to withstand the intoxicating influence of success 
than the depressing effects of adversity. Long continued 
success lulls to repose, and there is prophetic wisdom in 
the sentiment that "eternal vigilance is the price of 
liberty." 

That the Democratic party has made mistakes, com- 
mitted errors and blunders in political parlance worse 
than crimes, every candid mind will admit. It was the 
first party to proscribe the citizen for opinion's sake, 
thereby fettering the freedom of thought and of speech ; 
the first to proclaim the demoralizing doctrine that to 
the "victors belong the spoils," a doctrine well suited to 
the warrior, whose garments are dripping with blood, to 
cheer his minions on to victory, but the civic gown 
should be unstained. Is he capable? is he honest? should 
be the only inquiry in regard to the applicant for office, 
and the affirmative reply the only recommendation. The 
strict construction of the constitution by the Democratic 
party, led to nullification, secession, and rebellion — its 
unpardonable sin. 

The latitudinarian construction of the federal consti- 
tution by the Republican party, has led to the usurpation 
of powers, never contemplated by the founders of the 
government ; to the perpetration of gigantic frauds, in com- 
parison with which all former delinquencies pale into 
insignificance, and of corruptions whose enormity is 
exceeded only by their unblushmg confessions. * * 

Both parties need reform ; both have strayed from their 
5 



50 AUTOBIOGRAPHY 

first love, when Republican Democracy was beautiful in 
her simplicity, exact in her justice, and clad with the 
mantle of charity. Both parties should reform by cutting 
off excressences ; a skillful hand should hold the knife — 
the vital principle should remain untouched. 

Reform is the watchword of progress, and liberty fol- 
lows in her footsteps. But for the reform of magna 
charta, American liberty would have been postponed for 
centuries ; but for the reform of Luther, the civilization of 
the nineteenth century would have slumbered for ages. 
His activity awakened thought, and his enthusiasm 
inspired action. But for the reform inaugurated by the 
declaration of American independence, the nations of the 
earth would not now be struggling for freedom. Demo- 
cratic Republicans should reform by imitating their fore- 
fathers, by electing honest statesmen to the highest offices. 
Washington, Adams, Jefferson, Madison, Monroe, and 
Jackson, were men of practical common sense, fervid 
patriotism, and sterling integrity. 

The wholesale denunciation of parties is meaningless, 
unpatriotic, and unjust. The two great parties which 
have divided the American people since the organization 
of their government, have embraced men of lofty 
patriotism, of unsullied honor, of great ability, of pro- 
found statesmanship and of burning eloquence. A treas- 
onable sentiment never found a habitation in either party. 
They were composed of rival patriots ; and while a large 
majority of either party abhorred rebellion, the Repub- 
lican party was chiefly instrumental in suppressing it, for 
which it will secure the gratitude of every lover of the 
Union, as long as the Union lasts, which we hope may 
be perpetual. We cannot present to you at present the 
long catalogue of illustrious names belonging to these two 
parties. Democratic and Republican, names that have re- 
flected honor upon humanity, renown upon their country, 
glory upon the age in which they lived. Where in the annals 
of Greek and Roman history will you find so distinguished 
a triumvirate as that of Calhoun, Webster, and Clay? The 
first for his depth of thought, and force of logic, the sec- 



OF THE AUTHOR. 5 1 

end for the vastness of his comprehension and the sub- 
limity of his conceptions, the third for his practical com- 
mon sense, sterling integrity and burning eloquence. 
Thus have I endeavoured to present to you a truthful 
sketch of the character of our government, the principles 
which underUe it, the parties which have administered it, 
and in the spirit of prophecy caught a glimspe of 
the future. With the poet I can truly say '•^Qiia qua ipse 
* * * vidi, et quorum pars mmima fm." 
But It has been said that Democracy is dead — in a short 
time he who said it cannot be found ; he will have become 
a myth and live only in legendary lore. If Democracy 
has been dead, there is a resurrection from the dead ; 
there is a terrible shaking among the dry bones, 
a ground swell, an upheaval, and Democrats with 
that energy and devotion to the principles of liberty and 
equality which characterized them when honest Presi- 
dents held sway, are busily repairing the temple in which 
they worshipped. Democracy dead ! It is the normal 
state of man. It is his natural condition. Democracy is 
truth, and "truth never dies ; though crushed to earth, 
'twill rise again ; the eternal years of God are her's." But 
there is a good time coming. It has been proclaimed in 
St. Louis, it has been responded to in the South, it has 
been echoed in the North, it has transcended the Rocky 
Mountains, and been re-echoed from the shores of the 
Pacific. There's a good time coming; the day of judg- 
ment is at hand : the books will be opened, the accounts 
will be settled, and there will arise from the East and 
from the West, from the North and from the South, tne 
song of deliverance, the anthem of Jubilee, the triumphal 
shout, as loud as the seven apocalyptic thunders, that rend 
the rock-ribbed globe asunder. There's a good time 
coming when honest men rule, when peace and harmony 
and brotherly love come. The nations of the earth will 
rejoice, the Heavens will thunder their approval, and the 
great "I am," will say, "well done, good and faithful 
servants." 



52 AUTOBIOGRAPHV 

On the twenty-fifth of December, 1878, there was pub- 
lished in the Home Diary, the following description of 
Madison, which I had previously written : 

Madison, the capital city of Wisconsin, is located be- 
tween two of the four lakes which characterize this beau- 
tiful valley, midway between Milwaukee, on the shore of 
Lake Michigan, and Prairie du Chien, on the Mississippi 
river — nearly 100 miles from each. 

Like ancient Rome, Madison is built on seven hills, 
and resembles her in other particulars. Rome had her 
Tiber, Madison has her Yahara ; Rome had her Mars 
hill, in honor of the god of war ; Madison had her Uni- 
versity hill, dedicated to science, Hterature, and the arts 
of peace ; Rome had her gladiatorial exhibitions, in which 
the physical prevailed over the intellectual power ; Mad- 
ison has her commencements, in which superior mtellec- 
tual digladiation bears off the pilm of victory ; Rome had 
her legions, for conquest ; Madison has her citizen sol- 
diery, for defense ; Rome had her chariot races, in which 
victory was the prize and the reward ; Madison has her 
drives, meandering to the hill-tops, and, gently descend^ 
hig, winding around the shores of the lakes, in which 
pleasure is the prize and health the reward ; Rome had 
temples dedicated to thirty thousand gods ; Madison has 
churches consecrated to the worship of the Triune God ; 
the pe )ple of Rome belonged to the government; the 
government of Madison belongs to the people ; the civil- 
ization of Rome was that of the head ; the civilization of 
Madison is that of the head and of the heart. If history 
repeats itself, it is with progress. Our future attainments 
may terminate in the millenium. 

Madison has a population of 1 2,000 inhabitants ; enough 
to secure the advantages of the cities, and not enough to 
incur their evils. It is bounded on the North by Lake 
Mendota, a silvery sheet of limpid water, 20 miles in cir- 
cumference and of unknown depth ; on the South, by 
Lake Monona, 15 miles in circumference and of beau- 
tiful navigation for steam and sail and oar. From Angle 



OF THE AUTHOR. 53 

worm Station, on the shore of Lake Monona, and within 
two blocks of the Capitol Park, the steamers "Bay State," 
•'Scutanavvbequon" and "Niniogwanishkote," make fre- 
quent and regular trips to "Lake Side," "Winnequah" 
and other points accessible by land or water. At 
Nine Springs, three miles south of the city, is the 
State Fish Hatching-House, where it is proposed to rear 
other varieties than those contained in the four lakes. 
The classical scholar will be delighted to find here, the 
Naiades presiding over these fruitful waters, and the dis- 
ciples of Izaak Walton will rejoice that the sources of 
their anmsements have been multiplied. 

The approaches to Madison are from the North, South, 
East and Wes£, and are made with Hghtning speed ; the 
iron steeds know no wearmess, and desire no rest. The 
Capitol is located on Capitoline Hill, 70 feet above the 
lakes, and three blocks distant from each. It is built of 
white stone, resembUng marble, and in the shape of the 
Grecian cross. It has four airy porticos, decorated with 
Corinthian columns. It has a dome 180 feet in height, 
surmounted by a spire 350 feet above the lakes. On the 
summit rests the American Eagle, unmoved by the war 
of elements, occasionally raging around him. It is sur- 
rounded by a park of fourteen acres, with velvety turf, 
studded with oak, ash, elm, maple, evergreen pine and 
cedars rivaUng those of Lebanon. It is intersected with 
serpentine walks laid with asphaltum and bordered with 
umbrageous trees almost impenetrable by star or sunlight, 
forming promenades free from heat and dust. 

One mile distant, due West, is University Hill, of still 
greater eminence, upon which is built the State Univer- 
sity, comprising the colleges of Law, of Arts, of Letters, 
and the Female College. This hill commands a view of 
the City of Madison, the four Lakes with their marginal 
forests, and the rolUng ^prairie beyond. As in the physi- 
cal world there is no light without darkness, no sunshine 
without shade, there are,_in the world of mind, no bril- 
liant displays of genius or virtue, without occasional obscu- 
rity of intellect or depravity of heart. While on the 



54 AUTOBIOGRAPHY 

Southern shore of Lake Mendota, there are temples dedi- 
cated to science, literature and art, filled with votaries, 
there is, on the opposite shore, an asylum, in whose 
inmates the hght of mind and the love of glory are extin- 
guished ; wrecks of all that is Godlike in man. That 
asylum is a sad monument of human calamity, as well as 
a noble monument of human philanthropy. Madison 
has no rival as a place of Summer resort ; for the invalid 
who seeks health without the aid of nostrums ; for the 
man of business who escapes temporarily from its corro- 
ding cares; for the lover of Nature in her varied aspects 
of hill, dale and lake, and prairie gemmed with flowers ; 
for the devotee to science, art and literature, contained 
in her libraries ; for the lover of the chase, who, with 
horse, horn and hound, pursues the fleet deer through 
bush, brier and brake , for the disciples of Izaak Walton, 
who, with silent and watchful care, beguile the finny 
tribe ; for the contemplative and silent lover of Nature, 
there is music thrflling with life in the whirring wing of 
the partridge as he bursts away from his heathery cover ; 
there is warlike music in the scream of the eagle, as he 
soars on untiring wing and gazes with unblenched eye 
upon the sun ; there is music in the "tremulous, wild 
laughter of the loon ;" there is plaintive music in the 
cooing dove ; there is melodious music in the "curlew, 
conning her wild bravura;" there is music in all Nature. 

•'Through all the compass of the notes it ran, 
The diapason closing full in man." 

Madison is famous for the profound learning of her 
judges, the eloquence of her statesmen, the acumen of 
her lawyers, the skill of her physicians, the piety of her 
divines, the enterprise and taste of her merchants who 
import fabrics from every clime, surpassing in texture the 
famed products of the Grecian looms, with tints rivaling 
the Tyrian purple. She is famed for her historical, law 
and literary libraries, of 80,000 volumes ; for her calDinet 
of minerals ; for her pre-historic specimens of the stone 
and copper ages ; for her artesian well of mineral water, 
containing by analysis almost the identical properties of 



OF THE AUTHOR. 55 

the far-famed Waukesha springs. She is famous for her 
hotels, in which are found the juicy meats and vegetables 
of the farm, the venison of the forests, the grouse of the 
prairies, the ducks and fish of the lakes, the delicacies of 
the confectioner, and wine ripened by age, rivaling the 
old Falernian. The "Park" Hotel is a new building of 
architectural beauty, with modern improvements and 
tasteful appointments ; its halls, parlors and chambers 
are handsomely furnished, spacious and well ventilated ; 
its verandas and upper windows command extensive 
views of the four lake country, brightening here and there 
with the sparkling waters of Mendota, Monona, Waubesa, 
Kegonsa and Wingra. Col. A. H. West, the proprietor, 
is a gentleman of varied intelligence, with practical 
knowledge of business and men, with urbane manners, 
kindly sympathies, and that rare but valuable talent of 
making his guests feel at home. 

Madison is famous for the purity of the air brought to 
her upon the wings of the wind from the Rocky Moun- 
tains and from Polar ice, uncontaminated by epidemic 
disease. If a sultry breeze from the South should attempt 
to intrude upon her its hot and malarious breath, it would 
be lost in the nebulous mists of lakes Mend )ta and Mo- 
nona, guardian spirits, North and South of the beautiful 
city. Vladison is especially famous for the abiUty, learn- 
ing and taste of her women, as exhibited in their "Cen- 
tennial Records," for the publication of which, future 
generations will call them "blessed." 

It was the prayer of the dying patriot, that, after the 
lapse of centuries, he might be permitted to return to 
earth, to visit the scenes of his youth. If that patriot 
should have been an inhabitant of ancient Parnassus, 
famous for its beautiful groves, refreshing shades, its Del- 
phic Oracle, its Castahan spring, in which the Pythoness 
laved her symmetrical hmbs and Phidian form, famed as 
the favorite abode of Apollo and the Muses, (myths,) 
representing emanations of the "Divine Mind," and wor- 
shipped as so many divinities, — should that patriot visit 
Madison, the "Queen City of the Lakes," seeing its hills 



56 AUTOBIOGRAPHY 

and dales, its groves, its shrubbery, its flowers and its 
limpid waters, he would suppose that he had found the 
home of his youth ; and after breathing the pure air, en- 
joying the ambrosial luxuries of the city hostelies, drink- 
ing Castalia's inspiring waters, visiting the temples of 
Science and Art on University Hill, and finding not one, 
but several ApoUos ; not nine, but a host of Muses, he 
would with rapture exclaim with the poet : 

"THIS IS MY OWN, MY NATIVE LAND !" 



Delivered at Darlington, Wis., Sept. ioth, 1878. 

Mr. President and Gentlemen Farmers : — I have been 
invited to address you on the present occasion. Noth- 
ing has been said on the subject of the address, and I 
have been somewhat at a loss to select one best suited to 
my capacity and to your taste. Politics is the most 
popular theme ; but it is one for which I have no taste, 
and of which I have very little knowledge. Politics leads 
to demagogueism, which I thoroughly despise. I use the 
term politics in the common acceptation of the term, not 
in the higher and purer sense, which implies a knowledge 
of the science or policies of government ; subjects which 
have occupied the minds of the greatest thinkers in every 
age. I had special reference to the arts of the intriguers, 
the meddlers, the busy-bodies, who are ever ready to 
attend to everybody's business for a fee, whose maxim is 
"that the end justifies the means." This class of poli- 
ticians is rarely found among the farmers, w hose honesty, 
industry, prudence and economy are at war with their 
whole system. The farmer class constitutes the surest 
basis of all good government. They combine in a higher 
degree the elements of all great character, than any other 
class ; to wit : "honesty of purpose, practical common 
sense, self-knowledge, and self-government." While they 
are honorably and profitably occupied, they have leisure 
for thought, and thought is the source of all true great- 
ness. I presume the subject of farming would be most 
interesting to you, as it is your occupation and means of 



OF THE AUTHOR. 57 

living. I understand there are two kinds of farming, 
book farming and plow and hoe farming. I never studied 
book-farming, and therefore cannot give you the various 
theories in regird to the seeds suited to the climate, soil 
and time of planting ; the mode of cultivating the land, 
whether by deep or shallow plowing ; whether it should 
be done in the fall or spring ; and whether the other 
thousand things in and about a farm should be done in 
this way or that. I have tried farming with the hoe and 
the plow, in three different States, and failed in all. First, 
by losing the crops, by droughts, floods, bugs and gen- 
eral bad management, and secondly, by running in 
debt and mortgaging the farm, and by being sold out 
under a foreclosure. I know of but one mode by 
which I can teach you on the subject of farming, and 
that is by giving you a minute detail of all the particulars 
of my system, and then advise you to adopt the opposite 
in every particular. There is a right and a wrong way ; 
if mine was all wrong, the opposite must be all right. 
Although '. am not a model farmer, either in theory or in 
practice, I can point you to one of whom you have all 
heard more or less, and whom if you will imitate in that 
particular as well as in many others, you will be better 
citizens and better men. None of you have ever seen 
the farmer to whom I allude, yet you honor his name, 
and venerate his memory. He is generally called the 
father of his country, but his family name is George 
Washington. Yet to this honest farmer we are indebted 
for our independence, for our freedom, for our civiliza- 
tion ; all hail to George Washington, hero, patriot, sage 
and farmer. 

'Lordlings may flourish and may fade, 
A breath can make them, as a breath has made ; 
But the honest farmers, their country's pride, 
When once destroyed, can never be supplied. " 

I propose to delineate George Washington's character, 
and to prove to you that he and one other great man, 
are the only two really great men who have lived upon 
this earth during the last two thousand years. The other 



58 AUTOBIOGRAPHY 

great man was Julius Caesar, born on the 12th day of 
July, 1978 years at^o. They alone possessed the four 
primary elements of the human character, in an eminent 
degree ; to wit : honesty of purpose, practical common 
sense, self-knowledge, and self-government. 






REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN, 



Clinptet: ^nt 



GEORGE WASHINGTON. 



?EORGE WASHINGTON, the first President 
^fp^5s of t^^ United States, tvas born in Westmore- 
land county, Virginia, February 22, (old style, 11 1732, 
and died at Mount Vernon, December 14, 1799. The 
house in which he was born was in a parish called by 
the family name of Washington, near Pope's creek, a 
small tributary of the Potomac, about half a mile from its 
junction with that river. It was destroyed by fire during 
the boyhood of Washington, but in 18 15, a stone, with a 
suitable inscription, was placed on the spot by George 
Washington Parke Custis. The family to which Wash- 
ington belonged has not yet been satisfactorily traced in 



6o REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED M-N. 

England. The genealogies accepted by Sparks and 
Irving, and his other biographers, have been recently- 
proved to be inaccurate. His great-grandfather, John 
Washington, emigrated to Virginia, about 1657, with his 
brother Lawrence. George Washington was the son of 
Augustine Washington and his second wife, Mary Ball. 
After the burning of the house at Pope's creek, his father 
removed to a house on the Rappahannock, a short dis- 
tance below Fredericksburg. Here he died in 1743, 
leaving a large landed property to his widow and five 
children. To his oldest son, Lawrence, he bequeathed 
an estate on the Potomac, afterward known as Mount 
Vernon. George received only the education of the 
schools of the neighborhood, and his instruction at them 
did not go beyond reading, writing and arithmetic; with 
the addition — which must have been somewhat excep- 
tional — of book-keeping and surveying. He paid some 
attention to the French language, after the army of Count 
de Rochambeau arrived in this country ; but never 
attempted to speak it. His orthography was rather 
defective, a very common fault a century ago. Uniform 
tradition represented him to have attained an early 
development of physical strength. He took the lead in 
all the athletic sports and exercises of his companions. 
Though no great reliance can be placed upon most of 
the anecdotes which are related of his boyhood and 
youth, it is certain that he grew up of a vigorous, and, in 
early life, spare and agile frame, capable of inuch phys- 
ical endurance, remarkably strong in the arms, and a 
bold and graceful rider. Nor is there any doubt that he 



George Washington. 6i 

early acquired among his contemporaries, that character 
for justice, veracity and sterHng honor, which he sustained 
through Hfe. His elder brother, Lawrence, held a com- 
mission in one of the American regiments which were 
sent in 1740 to re enforce the army, under General 
Wentworth and Admiral Vernon, in the unsuccessful 
expedition against Carthagena. While on this expedition, 
Captain Lawrence Washington formed intimate, personal 
relations with the Admiral, and on his return at the close 
of the war, he gave to his newly occupied residence at 
Hunting Creek, the name of Mount Vernon, in honor of 
that popular naval hero. When George was 14 years old, 
a midshipman's warrant was obtained for him, and it is 
said that his clothes were packed to go on board ship. 
But his mother never cordially approved of the plan, 
and it was finally abandoned in consequence of her oppo- 
sition. Tradition represents her as a woman of vigorous 
character and masculine will. He was trained by her in 
habits of frugality and industry, to obey rightful authority, 
and to speak the truth. George Washington had ever 
been the favorite of Lawrence, and after leaving school, 
passed much of his time at Mount Vernon, occupied in 
summer with the usual routine of plantation hfe, and in 
winter and the studious hours of the year, with his favor- 
ite branch, surveying ; in which he became a great pro- 
ficient. He made it his profession, and was much 
employed by the eccentric Lord Fairfax, an English 
nobleman, who had made his home in Virginia, where 
he had a vast estate, and lived in a substantial stone 
dweUing, called Greenway Court, in the Shenandoah 



62 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN, 

Valley, which was then a wilderness. Three years were 
spent in this way, passing the summers in surveying 
Lord Fairfax's estates, and the winters principally at 
Mount Vernon. The foundations of his fortune, as far 
as it was derived from his own acquisition, were probably 
laid in part by the knowledge gained by actual inspection 
of the rich lands in Western Virginia, of which he after- 
ward become a large proprietor. In the course of his 
surveying tours, he frequently encountered parties of 
friendly Indians, and became famiHar with their manners, a 
knowledge of which soon stood him greatly m stead. The 
very scene of his labors as surveyor, the Northwestern 
frontier of Virgmia, became the theater of those move- 
ments and operations which formed the memorable com- 
mencement of his military career. The French and 
Indian war had its origin in the jealousy with which the 
French government contemplated the Ohio company, 
which was formed about this time, and of which Law- 
rence Washington was an active member. The attention 
of several of the colonial assemblies and of that of Vir- 
ginia among the first, was early called to this subject. In 
the anticipation of an Indian war, and probably of a 
rupture with France, the government of that colony 
began military preparations. The province was divided 
into districts, in one of which, Washington, then but 19 
years of age, received the appointment of Adjutant, with 
the rank of Major. But soon afterward his brother Law- 
rence was ordered to the West Indies for his health, and 
it was determined that George should accompany him. 
They sailed for Barbadoes in September, 1751, and 



GEORGE WASHINGTON. 6^ 

arrived after a voyage of five weeks They had scarcely 
been a fortnight in the island, when George was attacked 
with small-pox, by which he was slightly marked through 
life. Finding no material relief in Barbadoes, Lawrence 
Washington proposed to remove to Bermuda in the 
Spring, and George was sent back to conduct his sister- 
in-law to the last named island. He reached Virginia 
after a most tempestuous voyage ; but his brother's health 
grew rapidly worse, and the proposed removal to Ber- 
muda was abandoned. This was the only occasion on 
which Washington ever left the American continent. 
Lawrence Washington returned to Virginia in the sum- 
mer of 1752, and died shortly after, at the age of 34, 
leaving a large fortune to an infant daughter, who did not 
long survive him. By his will, of which George was one 
of the executors, the estate of Mount Vernon, was, on 
the demise of the daughter, given to George, who added 
to it materially by subsequent purchases. Though the 
youngest of the executors named in the will, yet, owing to 
his more intimate acquaintance with his brother's affairs, 
and his prospective interest in the property, the active 
management of the estate devolved upon him. In the 
meantime, the prospect of a coUision on the frontier 
increased. On the arrival of Dinwiddle, as colonial 
Governor, the military establishment was re-organized, 
and the province was divided into four districts, of which 
the Northern, including seven counties, was assigned to 
Washington, as Adjutant- General. The struggle of the 
French and English for the possession of the American 
continent was the great event of the middle of the i8th 



64 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

century. France intrenched herself on the St. Lawrence, 
and at the mouth of the Mississippi, and aimed by a line 
of posts through the interior, to confine the English to the 
comparatively narrow strips occupied by the Anglo- 
American colonies along the coast. The intervening 
territory, watered by the Ohio, was claimed by both, but 
settled as yet by neither ; in fact, it was occupied by 
Indians, with the exception of a settlement of twelve 
Virginia families, headed by Captain Gist; who had 
established themselves on the Monongahela. The 
Canadians erected a fort on a branch of French creek, 
about fifteen miles south of Lake Erie, and sent emissa • 
ries to the tribes northwest of the Ohio, to persuade them 
to break up the infant settlements of the Ohio company. 
Some of the Anglo-American traders, it is said, were 
seized and sent to France. Governor Dinwiddie, either 
for the purpose of protesting against these measures of 
the French, or perhaps of obtaining authentic information 
of their character, determined to despatch a special 
messenger to the residence of the French commander. 
After others to whom this appointment had been offered 
had declined it, it was accepted by Washington. The 
distance to be traversed, most of the way through a wil- 
derness, was between 500 and 600 miles ; winter was at 
hand, and the journey was to be made without military 
escort, through a territory occupied by Indian tribes. 
Washington started from Williamsburg, November 14, 
1753. At Gist's settlement on the Monongahela, he was 
joined by Gist, with whom he visited the French post, 
delivered his despatches, received a reply, and started for 



GEORGE WASHINGTON. 65 

home. His return was accompanied by great danger 
from Indians and from frozen rivers. He narrowly 
escaped assassination by a treacherous guide, and was 
nearly drowned in crossing the Alleghany. Washington's 
journal of this expedition, sent by Governor Dinwiddie to 
London, and pubhshed there, was regarded in England 
as a document of no litde importance, for the light which 
it shed on the designs of the French government with 
respect to the interior of this continent. The report of 
Washington left no doubt on the mind of Governor Din- 
widdie, that all attempts to extend the settlements toward 
the Ohio, would be forcibly resisted by the Canadian 
government. He accordingly convened the Assembly, 
and recommended active measures of preparation, at the 
same time calling the attention of the other colonial 
Governors to the impending danger. Virginia voted to 
raise a regiment of six companies, and one company, 
under Captain Treat, was immediately sent to take pos- 
session of the point at the confluence of the Alleghany 
and Monongahela (the present site of Pittsburg), which 
Washington had especially recommended as the site of 
a fort. The command of the regiment was given to 
Colonel Fry ; and Washington, who had refused to be a 
candidate for the Colonelcy, was appointed Lieutenant- 
Colonel. He moved forward with a part of the force, as 
soon as it could be got ready to take the field, and the 
chief command before long devolved upon him by the 
death of Colonel Fry. The mstructions of Governor 
Dinwiddie to the commander of the regiment, assumed 
the existence of a state of war, and commanded him "to 



66 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

drive away, kill and destroy, or seize as prisoners, all 
persons, not the subjects of the King of Great Britain, 
who should attempt to settle, or take possession of the 
lands on the Ohio river, or any of its tributaries." 
Washington reached Will's Creek, on his way to the 
Ohio, on April 20, 1754. Here he was met by the intel- 
ligence that Captain Trent's party, while building the 
fort, had been compelled, by an overwhelming force of 
French and Indians, to abandon the work. The French 
completed it, and called it Fort Duquesne, in honor of 
the Governor of Canada. Although it eventually 
appeared that the reported numbers of the French and 
Indians were enormously exaggerated, the state of affairs 
was extremely critical. Washington, however, advanced 
as rapidly as possible. Having received inform- 
ation from the friendly Indians, that a party of 
French had been out for two days, determined to attack 
the first body of English they should meet ; as a measure 
of precaution, he threw up an intrenchment on the Great 
Meadows. This information was confirmed during the 
night by an express from the chief of the friendly Indians. 
Washington placed himself at the head of fifty men, and 
in company with a band of friendly Indians, after a forced 
and laborious night march, came upon the enemy at an 
early hour the next morning. (May 28.) The French 
were' completely surprised, and a brief action followed. 
M. Jumonville, the French commander, and ten of his 
men, were killed ; and the rest of the party (except one, 
who escaped) twenty-two in number, were taken prison- 
ers. On the side of the Virginians one was killed, and two 



GEORGE WASHINGTON, 67 

or three wounded. The prisoners were marched to the 
Great Meadows, and thence under guard to Williams- 
burg. Considerable re-enforcements were raised, and 
advanced as far as Winchester ; but, with the exception 
of an independent company from South Carolina, under 
Captain Mackey, none of them reached the Great Mead- 
ows, where the whole force amounted to less than 400 
men. As Washington anticipated, after the defeat of 
Jumonville's party, a strong force was put in motion 
against him, from Fort Duquesne. He strength- 
ened the entrenchment at the Meadows, and 
named it Fort Necessity. Captain Mackey, as 
an officer holding a commission, claimed pre- 
cedence of the provincial Colonel. To prevent a 
collision of authority, Washington advanced with 
his regiment, leaving Mackey and his company as a guard 
at the fort. Two weeks were required to force a march 
of thirteen miles through a gorge of the mountains to 
Gist's settlement. Here authentic information was re- 
ceived that the enemy at Fort Duquesne had been 
strongly reinforced, and might be shortly looked for. 
Washington having determined to make a stand at the 
settlement, Capt. Mackey was sent for, and promptly 
brought up his company. It was, however, decided by 
a council of war, that the enemy was too strong to be 
resisted, and a retreat to Fort Necessity was deemed ex- 
pedient. The retrograde movement occupied two days, 
and they were soon attacked by a greatly superior force 
of French and Indians. At 11 o'clock at night the French 
commander proposed a parley. Suspecting this to be a 



68 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

ruse to send an officer into the fort in order to obtain in- 
formation as to its condition, the offer was twice declined 
by Washington, but was at length accepted. The terms 
of the capitulation were honorable. The Virginians were 
to retain everything in their possession, but the artillery, 
to march out of the fort with the honors of war, and to 
be allowed to retreat unmolested to the settlements. Not- 
withstanding the disastrous termination of the campaign, 
not the slightest reproach was cast on Washington. 

In 1755, two regiments of royal troops were sent out 
under the veteran Braddock, with which, and the pro- 
vincials of Virginia, the campaign was opened. Wash- 
ington, disgusted with the precedence enjoyed by the 
officers of the regular army, threw up his commission, but 
tendered his services as a volunteer aide to Gen. Brad- 
dock, who gladly accepted them. In consequence of a 
severe illness, Washington was left behind at the Great 
Meadows, where he consented to remain only on con- 
dition that he should be allowed to join the army before 
•an engagement took place. In the memorable event of 
July 9th, 1755, known as Braddock's defeat, Washington 
was almost the only officer of distinction who escaped 
from the calamities of the day with life and honor. The 
other aides of Gen. Braddock were disabled early in the 
action, and Washington alone was left in that capacity on 
the field. In a letter to his brother, he says : "I had four 
bullets through my coat, and two horses shot under me, 
yet I escaped unhurt, though death was levelling my 
companions on every side." His fellow aide. Col. Orme, 
who was the witness of his conduct, says he discharged 



GEORGE WASHINGTON. 69 

the perilous duties which devolved upon him "with the 
greatest courage and resolution." A seal which had been 
carried by Washington, with his initials, probably shot 
away from his person, was found, after the lapse of eighty 
years, on the battlefield. No attempt was made by the 
French to pursue their advantage, but the reverse at Fort 
Duquesne naturally caused a general alarm in the province. 
A force of two thousand men was raised by the assembly, 
of which the chief command, notwithstanding the recent 
disasters, and the preference by the Governor for another 
candidate, was conferred on Washington. His head- 
qaarters were established at Winchester, and the duty of 
protecting the frontier devolved upon him until the end 
of the war. 

The unfailing embarrassments of such a service, the 
impatience of a militia force raised by drafting and im- 
pressment, unpaid and poorly clad, the frauds of con- 
tractors, contradictory and preposterous orders from the 
Governor, the intrigues of rivals seeking to supplant him ; 
the arrogant pretensions of a subordinate, and wholesale 
desertions on the approach of danger — these were some 
of the difficulties with which he had to contend for the 
rest of the war. In February, 1756, Washington made a 
hurried visit to Boston, the headquarters of Gov. Shirley, 
of Massachusetts, who had lately been appointed com- 
mander-in-chief of the royal forces in North America. 
His object was to submit to the Governor the question of 
precedence which had sprung up between the provincial 
officers, and those commissioned by the crown ; it was 
justly decided in favor of precedence according to seni- 



70 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

ority. The years 1756 and 1757 passed without any im- 
portant military event in the southern department, but 
the labors and cares of his station told even upon the 
strong constitution of Washington, and he was prostrated 
with a fever for four months. In 1758 he held the chief 
command of the Virginia contingent in the ill-conducted, 
and ail-but abortive campaign under Gen. Forbes against 
Fort Duquesne. Nearly all the faults of Braddock's expe- 
dition were repeated, and with a narrow escape from the 
same results. Washington formed a matrimonial engage- 
ment with Mrs. Martha Custis, the wealthy widow of 
John Parke Custis, in the summer of 1758, and married 
her on January 17th, 1759. Having been five years in 
the military service, and vainly sought promotion in the 
royal army, he took advantage of the fall of Fort Du- 
quesne, and the expulsion of the French from the valley 
of the Ohio, to resign his commission. His proved cour- 
age, discretion and resources had gained for him the con- 
fidence of the conceited and pragmatical Dinwiddie and 
the headstrong and arrogant Braddock, as they did after- 
ward of the circumspect and persevering Forbes ; but in 
England they earned for him nothing but a good-natured 
rebuke from George II, and a sneer from Horace Wal- 
pole. Shortly after his marriage, Washington removed 
to Mount Vernon, where he enlarged the mansion, em- 
bellished the grounds, and added to the estate. As a 
member of the provincial assembly, his winters were passed 
in Williamsburg. He was at no period an active partizan 
leader, but at all times, and in all assemblies, he exercised 
a paramount influence, by soundness of judgement and 



GEORGE WASHINGTON. 7 I 

weight of character. Tobacco and wheat were, before 
the revolution, the staple products of his plantations. The 
wheat was ground to flour upon the estate, and what was 
not wanted for home consumption was sold at Alexandria 
or shipped from the river. The tobacco was usually 
shipped directly to Liverpool, Bristol or London, from 
which a part of the returns were received in English 
manufactures. The management of a large estate under 
such a system, partook somewhat of the nature of com- 
merce. Invoices of the articles to be exported, and orders 
for the articles to be received in exchange, were to be 
made out with mercantile exactness. Account books 
were to be kept, and an extensive correspondence carried 
on. All this labor was performed by Washington, with 
his own hand, and with remarkable precision and neat- 
ness. The estate at Mount Vernon, as it was in the lat- 
ter years of his life, consisted of about eight thousand 
acres. One- half of this was in wood, or uncultivated 
lawns, but about four thousand acres were in tillage and 
managed directly by Washington. The cultivated lands 
lay in five farms, each with its appropriate set of laborers, 
directed by an overseer, the whole, during his long ab- 
sences from home, under a general superintendent. Dur- 
ing his absence, each of the overseers was required to 
make a weekly written report to the superintendent, con- 
taining a minute account of everything done on the 
farm in the course of the week, including the condition 
of the stock and the number of days work done by each 
laborer. The reports were recorded in a book by the 
superintendent, who then sent the originals in a weekly 



72 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

letter to General Washington. A weekly answer was 
returned ; usually a letter of four pages, sometimes of 
twice that length, carefully prepared from a rough draft, 
then neatly transcribed by the writer, after which a press 
copy was taken. The rotation of crops in his numerous 
fields, was arranged by himself for years beforehand The 
culture of tobacco was given up, in the latter part of his 
life, as exhausting to the soil and unfavorable to the health 
of his laborers. Being the proprietor of a large landed 
property in Eastern Virginia, Washington was, as a mat- 
ter of course, a slave-holder. He inherited a plantation 
cultivated by slaves, and their number was greatly in- 
creased by the dowry of his wife. The whole number 
belonging to the estate of Washington, in his own right, 
at the time of his decease, was 124 ; the "dower negroes," 
as they are styled in his will, were probably as numerous. 
His correspondence shows him to have been a strict and 
vigilant, but at the same time, a kind, just and consid- 
erate master ; not more careful of his own interests, than 
of the health and comfort of his dependents. As early 
as 1786, he had formed a resolution never, unless com- 
pelled by particular circumstances, "to possess another 
slave by purchase." In a letter written to Mr. Morris, in 
that year, he says : "There is not a man living who wishes 
more sincerely than I do, to see a plan adopted for the 
abolition of slavery. But there is only one proper and 
effectual mode by which it can be accomplished, and that 
is by legislative authority ; and this, as far as my suffrage 
will go, will never be wanting." This sentiment recurs 
in several parts of his correspondence. In accordance 



GEORGE WASHINGTON. 73 

with the views which he had so long entertained, he pro- 
vided for the freedom of his slaves on the death of his 
wife. 

"To emancipate them before," he remarks in his will, 
"would, though earnestly wished by me, be attended with 
such insuperable difficulties on account of their intermix- 
ture by marriage with the dower negroes, as to excite the 
most painful sensations, if not disagreeable consequences, 
to the latter, while both descriptions are in the occupancy 
of the same person, it not being in my power, under the 
tenure by which the dower negroes are held, to manumit 
them." For the support and education of those eman- 
cipated, and especially for the support of his favorite ser- 
vant, Billy, provision was made by his will. In 1770, 
attended by his friend Dr. Craik, Washington made a 
journey to Western Virginia. From Pittsburg the party 
descended the Ohio in river boats. Among their objects 
m visiting the Great Kanawha, was the selection of fertile 
lands in that region still lying in a state of nature. 

Washington was a member of the House of Burgesses 
during the whole period of that war of legislation in Eng- 
land, and popular resistance and agitation in the colonies, 
which preceded the appeal to arms. His military edu- 
cation, his great stake as a property holder, and his 
habitual respect for lawful authority, led him, as they did 
all of his class, to deprecate a rupture with the mother- 
country ; but the moment it became evident that the 
connection could be kept up only by the sacrifice of the 
principle that representation and taxation should go hand 
in hand, he placed himself in the front rank of the patriots. 



74 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

The principles which guided him are summarily expressed 
in a letter written from Philadelphia, during his attend- 
ance as a member of the first continental Congress, in 
the Autumn of 1774, to Captain Mackenzie, a brother 
officer of the old war, then stationed in Boston. 

"I think" said he, "I can announce it as a fact, that it 
is not the wish nor the interest of the government of Mas- 
sachusetts, or any other government upon this continent, 
separately or collectively, to set up for independence ; 
but this you may rely on, that none of them will ever 
submit to the loss of those valuable rights and privileges 
which are essential to the inhabitants of every free State, 
and without which, life, Uberty and property are rendered 
insecure." On April 19th, 1775, the appeal to arms was 
made at Lexington and Concord; and the continental 
Congress, which in the preceding October had vowed 
eternal loyalty to George III, on June 15th, following, 
unanimously elected George Washington commander-in- 
chief ot the armies of the revolution. The war was con- 
ducted by Washington under every possible disadvantage. 
He engaged in it without any personal experience in the 
handling of large bodies ot men, and this was equally 
the case with all of his subordinates. The continental 
Congress, under whose authority the war was waged, was 
destitute of all the attributes of an efficient government. 
It had no power of taxation, and no right to compel the 
obedience of the individual. The country was nearly as 
destitute of the tnaierial of war as of the means of pro- 
curing it; it had no foundries, no arsenals, no forts, no 
navy, no means, no credit. The opposing power had all 



GEORGE WASHINGTON. 75 

the prestige of an ancient monarcliy, of the legitimate 
authority of disciplined and veteran armies, of a powerful 
navy, of the military possession of most of the large 
towns, and the machinery of government for peace and 
war. It had also the undoubted sympathy of a consid- 
erable portion of the people, especially of the wealthy 
class. That Washington, carrying on the war under 
these circumstances, met with frequent reverses, and that 
the progress of the revolution as conducted by him, 
seemed often languid and inert, is less wonderful than 
that he rose superior to such formidable obstacles, and 
was able, with unexhausted patience and matchless skill, 
to bring the contest eventually to an auspicious and hon- 
orable close. He took command of the forces besieging 
Boston, on July 3rd, 1775. No event of great signifi- 
cance followed for six months. The country fretted under 
the inaction of the army ; the army languished under in- 
discipline, the homesickness of raw troops, inoculation of 
small-pox, the want of every requisite for strength or com- 
fort, and especially a military chest. The evacuation of 
Boston on March 17th, 1776, was the glorious reward of 
the perseverance and skill of the commanding general. 
Then followed in rapid succession the disasters of Long 
Island, of Fort Washington, and of the calamitous retreat 
through the Jerseys. The brilliant coup de mam of Tren- 
ton, and the substantial success of Princeton restored the 
droopmg courage of the people ; but they were followed 
by the reverse at Brandy wine, and the terrible winter at 
Valley Forge. The next summer (1778), the courage 
and skill of Washington turned a disgraceful commence- 



76 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

ment of the day at Monmouth into a substantial victory, 
but from that time forward no brilliant success attended 
the forces under his immediate command, until the final 
blow was struck with the overwhelming numbers of the 
combined American and French forces at Yorktown. 
After this great success the war still dragged out a linger- 
ing existence. More than two years elapsed from the 
capitulation of Yorktown, (October, 1781,) to the evacu- 
ation of New York, (Nov. 25th, 1783). Events like these 
do not surely make a brilliant military career, when tried 
by the popular standard of success. At times they shook 
even the well-established popularity of Washington. The 
all-important success of Gates at Saratoga formed an un- 
satisfactory contrast with Brandywine and Germantown, 
which occurred in the same campaign. The second 
place in the army was held for three years by Generaj 
Charles Lee, a turbulent and empty braggart, perpetually 
laboring in secret to undermine the popularity he dared 
not openly assail ; while cabals and boards of war m Con- 
gress endeavored, by disgusting the commander-in-chief, 
to drive him to resignation ; but in vain. The country 
saw that he was doing his best with his wretchedly lim- 
ited means ; that he was hopeful while others were de- 
spondent ; that he was wise and prudent, while others 
were indiscreet, feeble or rash ; in fact that the cause was 
embodied in him, and in his hold on the hearts of the 
people. 

On December 23rd, 1783, Washington, in a parting 
address of surpassing beauty, resigned his commission as 
commander-in-chief of the army of the Contmental Con- 



GEORGE WASHINGTON. 77 

gress, sitting at Annapolis. He retired immediately to 
Mount Vernon, and resumed his occupation as a farmer 
and planter, anxiously shunning all connection with pub- 
lic life. Much of his time, however, was occupied by a 
laborious correspondence on the infinity of subjects con- 
nected with the revolutionary war, and by the throng of 
visitors from every part of the Union and of Europe. In 
1784 he crossed the Alleghanies, partly to look after his 
lands in that region, and partly to explore the headwaters 
of the rivers which rise in the interior of Virginia with a 
view to their connection with the Western waters. On 
his return he addressed a memoir on this subject to the 
Legislature of Virginia, which led to the organization of 
the James River and Potomac Canal Companies. In 
acknowledgement of his agency on this occasion, and still 
more of his revolutionary services, the State of Virginia 
presented him with fifty shares in the Potomac canal, 
valued at $10,000. and 100 shares in the James river 
canal, valued at $50,000. He accepted the donation 
only as the trustee of some public object. The shares in 
the James river canal were appropriated by him for the 
endowment of a college at Lexington, in Rockbridge 
county, Virginia, which in consequence, assumed the 
name of Washington College. The shares in the Poto- 
mac canal were appropriated as the endowment of a 
University at the seat of the Federal Government. The 
United States, as is well known, after the Revolution, fell 
into a state of governmental inanition, bordering on 
anarchy. The recommendations of the Continental 
Congress were without weight, no revenue accrued to the 



78 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

Treasury, and the European debt, principal and interest, 
remained unpaid. Foreign governments held the United 
States in low repute ; the Indian tribes scourged the 
frontier; the separate States instead of acting in harmony, 
enacted conflicting laws for imposing duties on foreign 
commerce: in a word, discontent was universal. To 
put an end to the controversies between Maryland and 
Virginia, relating to the navigation of the rivers which 
divided their territory, a meeting took place at Alexandria 
in 1785, and while there the members made a visit to 
Mount Vernon. This led to a call of a Convention of 
Delegates, which was assembled at Annapolis in 1786, of 
which the object was "to take into consideration the trade 
of the United States, to examine the relative situation and 
trade of the said States; and to consider how far a uni 
form system in their commercial regulations may be nec- 
essary to their common interest and permanent harmony." 
The delegates of only five States attended this meet- 
ing, and some of them with powers too limited for any 
valuable purpose. They drew up a report recommending 
a meeting in Philadelphia, the following May, under the 
sanction of the Continental Congress. Washington 
warmly approved these proceedings, though from some 
motive of personal delicacy, perhaps, as a riparian pro- 
prietor on one of the rivers whose navigation was the 
original cause of the movement, he declined to serve as a 
delegate to the preliminary meeting; but he was a mem- 
ber of the convention which met at Philadelphia, in May, 
1787, and framed the Constitution of the United States. 
Washington was unanimously elected its President ; but 



GEOKGE WASHINGTON. 79 

as is usual in deliberative bodies of this kind, most of the 
business was transacted in Committee of the Whole, 
Nathaniel Gorham, of Massachusetts, being placed by 
Washington from day to day in the chair. On September 
17, 1787, the fruit of the labors of this patriotic body was 
given to the people of the United States, with an ofificial 
letter from the President of the Convention ; and having 
been ratified by the requisite number of States, it went 
into operation in 1789. This Constitution, though not 
deemed perfect in every point by Washington, was 
regarded by him as the best that could be hoped for — the 
only alternative for anarchy and civil war. It was far 
from being warmly or generally welcomed ; and it is 
doubtful whether it would have been adopted but for the 
great popularity of Washington, who was instinctively 
marked out by public expectation as the first President. 
He was chosen by the unanimous votes of the electoral 
colleges. New York alone not having taken interest 
enough in the organization of the government to appoint 
electors. John Adams was elected Vice-President, 
Another striking proof of the stagnation of interest in the 
new Constitution, may be seen in the fact, that although 
the 4th of March, 1789, was fixed upon for the meeting of 
the First Congress, a bare quorum of the House of Rep- 
resentatives did not assemble till the ist of April, nor of 
the Senate till the 6th; and it was not till the 30th that 
President Washington was inaugurated. In the summer, 
the newly elected President had a dangerous fit of illness 
at New York, then the seat of Government. His disease 
was a malignant carbuncle in the thigh, which was 



8o REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

cured by a surgical operation skillfully performed by 
Doctor Bard the younger. In the autumn of this year 
the President made a tour through the Eastern States, 
travelling with his own horses and carriage. A similar 
journey was made through the Southern States in the 
following spring. These tours were attended with an 
unbroken series of ovations. The Constitution of 1789, 
as far as the objects are concerned for which the Union 
was framed, created a Government as complete as the 
Government of Great Britain or France ; and Washing- 
ton was called to put this newly framed and untried 
Government into operation. He called to his Cabinet 
Mr. Jefferson for the Department of State, Mr. Hamilton 
for the Treasury, and General Knox for the Department 
of War. There was for some years, no Navy or Naval 
Department. 

Foreign affairs were in an unsatisfactory condition. 
England allowed eight years to pass from the treaty of 
1783 before she sent a minister to the United States, 
although a minister was early sent to London by the Con- 
gress of the Confederation. In the meantime active 
causes of irritation existed between the two countries ; on 
the part of the United States, the obstacles thrown by 
state legislation in the way of recovering debts due to 
British subjects ; on the part of England, the detention 
of the western posts and the impressment of American 
seamen. The states general met in France the same 
year that the Constitution of the United States went into 
operation. Our relations with that country soon fell into 
inextricable confusion. A considerable debt was due to 



GEORGE WASHINGTON. 51 

France and Holland. General apathy, distrust, and 
uneasy expectation reigned at home. Out of this chaos 
order was speedily educed by the administration, guided 
by Washington's own consummate prudence, and not- 
withstanding the existence in the cabinet itself of early 
developed elements of discord. The discussions with 
Great Britain after the arrival of the first minister in 1791, 
were skillfully and patiently conducted by Mr. Jefferson. 
The insults of the French envoys were mildly repelled or 
borne with a stoical equanimity, in remembrance of the 
services rendered to us by France in the hour of trial. 
The genius of Hamilton gave us the funding system, and 
with it revenue and credit. The assumption of the State 
debts created living capital out of the ashes of revolu 
tionary bankruptcy. Our commerce, protected by a 
national flag and emancipated from the colonial restric- 
tions of Great Britain, began to whiten every sea ; and 
the vacant lands in the western counties of the Atlantic 
States filled up with a rapidly increasing population. The 
settlement of the territories on the right bank of the Ohio 
was prevented during the first administration of Wash- 
ington, by the non-surrender of the western posts. Their 
detention by Great Britain gave strength and audacity to 
the Indian tribes, and entailed upon the frontier the dis- 
asters of two unsuccessful campaigns ; that of Harip.er iii 
1790, and especially that of St. Clair in 1791. The first 
measures of the administration in the organization of the 
government, the establishment of the courts of justice, and 
the machinery for collecting duties on imports, were not 

attended with serious political embarrassment. Little was 

7 



82 REMINISCENCES Of" t)ISTINGUISHEi5 MEN. 

required to be done by the President, but to give his 
official sanction to the acts of Congress. There were, 
however, not only in that body, but in the cabinet con- 
flicting tendencies. The party which had opposed the 
adoption of the Constitution, and were thence known as 
anti-federalists, were now opposed to the system of policy 
which was designed to strengthen the general govern- 
ment ; while the federalists, who had procured the adop- 
tion of the Constitution, were in favor of measures that 
would give efficiency to the central power, and make the 
Union a reality instead of a name. The latter party was 
represented in the Cabinet by Hamilton, the Secretary of 
the Treasury, supported by the Secretary of War, Gen. 
Knox. The former by Jefferson, the Secretary of State, 
sustained by Randolph, the Attorney General. Neither 
of these latter gentlemen, however, had opposed the 
adoption of the Constitution. C n the contrary , Randolph 
had vigorously supported it in the Virginia convention, 
and Jefferson being in France at the time, had taken no 
active part on the question of its adoption. Washington 
exerted all his influence to m oderate between the diverg- 
ing tendencies of his cabinet councilors. The details of 
the funding system, the assumption of the state debts, and 
the establishment of the bank of the United States, were 
the measures which revealed in all its strength this divis- 
ion of opinion in the cabinet, the legislature and the 
country. All of every party were, or professed to be, in 
favor of some measure for funding the national debt and 
creating a solvent treasury ; but the details of the meas- 
ures necessary to this end afforded much occasion for 



George Washington. B;^ 

controversy. Washington listened with the utmost can- 
dor and patience to the opposite opinions of the mem- 
bers of his cabinet, but eventually gave his support to the 
general views ot the Secretary of the Treasury. The con- 
flict was most violent on the subject of assuming to a lim- 
ited extent the revolutionary debt of the individual States. 
This was large in some of the States, and small or null 
in others. The States of the latter class, principally those 
of the south, were unwilling that the common treasury 
should assume a burden from which no benefit would 
accrue to them. 

The fact that these State securities, like those of the 
Union, had passed from the hands of the original holders 
at a greatly depreciated rate, was the ground of a popu- 
lar objection to the entire policy of assumption. Con- 
gress was about equally divided on the subject, as also 
upon a measure which was contemporaneously under 
discussion, that of a permanent seat for the general gov- 
ernment. The first Congress met at New York, and the 
second at Philadelphia. A majority of the members from 
the northern and middle States were desirous of making 
the latter city the permanent metropolis of the Union. 
An arrangement was finally made in reference to the two 
questions, in virtue of which the State debts were 
assumed to the amount of $20,000,000, and the seat of 
the federal government was established on the banks of 
the Potomac. It was understood that this settlement 
was in full concurrence with the wishes of the Pres- 
ident. In fact, no object was nearer his heart than 
to prevent the growth of an embittered party spirit, 



§4 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

especially when it assumed the force of a sectional divis- 
ion. His official course, as far as possible, tended to 
check this great evil, and the most earnest and affection- 
ate appeals were made by him in private, to the two great 
leaders of the opposite parties in his Cabinet. From an 
early period there was a great resort of visitors to 
the seat of Government. The President held a reception 
for men on Tuesday, on Friday afternoon Mrs. Washing- 
ton received both sexes, and on Thursday there was a din- 
ner party for invited guests. Washington was sensitive to 
the cavils of which his receptions were the subject, and 
bestowed more attention perhaps than they deserved on 
the attempt to show their injustice. He probably cared 
little for them in themselves, but regarded them as indica- 
tions that in time his hold on the pubHc confidence might 
be shaken with reference to matters of greater importance. 
These feelings, and a growing desire to return to the 
more tranquil enjoyments of private life, determined 
him, as the close of his first administration approached, 
to announce the purpose of declining a re-election. 
With this object he requested the assistance of Mr. 
Madison in preparing a valedictory address to 
the people. But his purpose was overcome by the 
warm dissuasions of personal and political friends 
of all parties, and in the autumn of 1792 he was 
unanimously re-elected. Adams was re-elected Vice- 
President, The great rivals in the Cabinet gave place to 
men of inferior abiHty, but pursuing the same line of 
policy as their predecessors. Decisive measures were 
adopted in reference to foreign relations. 



GEORGE WASHINGTON. 85 

The proclamation of neutrality rescued the country 
from the imminent peril of bemg drawn into the vortex 
of the French revolution. The treaty negotiated with 
England, by Chief Justice Jay, settled several of the 
subjects of controversy with that country. The victory 
of Wayne broke the power of the Indians in the North- 
west, and the treaty of Greenville and the surrender of 
the Western posts under Jay's treaty assured the peace of 
the Western frontier. The general tranquility was for a 
season disturbed by the "whisky insurrection," in the 
western counties of Pennsylvania ; but a body of 15,000 
of the militia of the neighboring States, was called out by 
President Washington, and the insurrection was crushed 
in one short campaign, without an effusion of blood. It 
might have been hoped that in thus scattering the clouds 
of foreign war, giving safety to a vast unsettled frontier, 
infusing life into every branch of industry, and conduct- 
ing the country step by step, in the path of an unex- 
ampled prosperity, the popularity of the President, which 
indeed could not have been augmented, would at least 
have been sustained. At no period of his life, however, 
was it so materially impaired as in the last years of his 
second administration, and nowhere so much as in 
Virginia. Early in 1796, he formed the irrevocable 
purpose of retiring, and took counsel with Hamilton, no 
longer his official adviser, but still retaining all his confi- 
dence, as to the preparation of his "Farewell Address." 
This was issued to the country September 17, 1776. At 
the close of the next session of Congress, Washington 
retired, as he thought, iorever, from the public service. 



86 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

and withdrew to Mount Vernon. But a year had hardly 
elapsed before our long standing controversy with the 
directory of France culminated in a quasi war. Meas- 
ures of preparation, military and naval, were adopted by 
Congress, and Washington was appointed Lieutenant- 
General of the armies of the United States. He had 
never believed that the Government of France would 
push the controversy to the arbitrament of war ; but he 
did not live to see the threatening cloud dispersed . The 
commencement of December, 1796, found him in remark- 
ably good health, approaching the close of his 68th year, 
and in the entire enjoyment of his physical and mental 
faculties. On the morning of Thursday the 12th, after 
writing to Hamilton, he took his usual ride around his 
farms. The day was overcast when he started, and about 
one o'clock, "it began to snow, soon after to hail, and 
then turned to a settled, cold rain." He remained for 
two hours longer in the saddle, and on his return home, 
sat down to dinner without changing his dress, although 
the snow when he came into the house was clinging to 
his hair. 

The next day there were three inches of snow on the 
ground in the morning, and Washington, complaining 
of a cold, omitted his usual ride. As it cleared up in 
the afternoon, he went out to superiniend some work 
upon the lawn. He passed the evening, as usual, read- 
ing the papers and answering the letters of the day, and 
in conversation with his secretary. Between two and 
three o'clock in the morning of Saturday he awoke Mrs. 
Washington, telling her he had had an ague fit, and was 



GEORGE WASHINGTON. 87 

very unwell; but he would not allow the family to be 
disturbed for aid. At daybreak his secretary was called, 
and his physician, Dr. Craik, who lived at Alexandria, 
was sent for. At sunrise he was bled by one of his over- 
seers, but with little relief, and he rapidly grew worse. 
Dr. Craik arrived about eleven o'clock; blood letting was 
repeated, and other remedies were adopted, but without 
effect. Two consulting physicians arrived during the 
day, and venesection was again attempted. About half 
past four he requested Mrs. Washington to bring two 
papers from his study. Having examined them, he gave 
her back one to be destroyed, and the other to be pre- 
served as his will. He continued to speak and swallow 
with increasing difficulty, and suffered great pain, but 
retained his faculties to the last; and gave a few directions 
relative to his affairs and his burial. About four o'clock 
in the afternoon he said to Dr. Craik: " I die hard, but 
I am not afraid to go. I believed from my first attack 
that I should not survive it. My breath cannot last 
long. At 6 o'clock, as the three physicians stood by his 
bedside, he said to them: " I feel myself going; I thank 
you for your attentions, but I pray you to take no more 
trouble about me. Let me go off quietly ; I cannot last 
long. " About ten o'clock, after several unsuccessful 
attempts to speak intelligibly, he said to Mr. Lear, his 
secretary: " I am just going ; have me decently buried, 
and do not let my body be put into the vault till three 
days after I am dead. " He presently said: " Do you 
understand me ? " and on Mr. Lear's replying that he 
did, Washington said: " It is well. " These were the last 



88 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. • 

words which he spoke. Between eleven and twelve 
o'clock, and about ten minutes before he died, his breath- 
ing became easier. He lay quietly, withdrew his hand 
from Mr Lear's and felt his own pulse. At this moment 
his countenance changed, .his hand fell from his wrist, 
and he expired without a struggle. The disease of 
which he died was '' acute laryngitis, " of rare occur- 
rence, and never described till ten years later by Dr. 
Matthew Bailey, of London. In the House of Repre- 
sentatives of the United States, appropriate resolutions 
drawn by Gen. Henry Lee, one of the members from 
Virginia, were, in his absence, moved by his colleague, 
John Marshall, soon after appointed Chief Justice of the 
United States. They express the public sorrow at the 
loss of him who was " first in war, first in peace, first in 
the hearts of his fellow citizens." This expression is 
repeated in the funeral oration pronounced by Gen. Lee 
at the request of the committee of arrangement,s with 
the substitution of the word " countrymen " for "fellow- 
citizens, " and it is now usually quoted with that change. 
His person in youth was spare but well-proportioned, 
and never too stout for prompt and easy movement. 
His hair was brown, liis eyes blue and far apart, his hands 
large, his arms uncommonly strong, the muscular 
development of his frame perfect. He was a bold and 
graceful horseman, and followed the hounds with eager- 
ness and spirit. He was scrupulously attentive to the 
proprieties of dress and personal appearance. His 
manner was gracious and gentle; especially toward 
the young, with a certain military reserve in public circles . 



GEORGE WASHINGTON. 89 

His manly form and muscular power, were fit instruments 
for the execution of his heroic will ; whatever his hands 
found to do, was done with a willing and a cheerful 
spirit ; he shrunk from no labor , he relaxed under no 
fatigue. He was not intoxicated by prosperity, he was 
not depressed by adversity ; he preserved his self-govern- 
ment amid all changes. Conscientiousness was the dom- 
inant trait in his character, and the performance of duty 
its happiest illustration ; as son, husband, neighbor and 
friend, he was a model for all imitation, and when he 
became the Father of his people, his children vied with 
each other in love and veneration for their illustrious 
parent. In George Washington we see a man marked 
by no brilliant or dazzling quahties, by no assumption of 
superiority over other men, and unadorned except by the 
simplicity and grandeur of nature. He was upwards of 
six feet in height, and of perfectly symmetrical form, 
capable of performing great labor and enduring much 
fatigue. His movements were exceedingly dignified, his 
manners easy and affable ; a grave repose pervaded his 
features which repressed all attempts at familiarity in his 
presence. His temper was humane, benevolent and con- 
ciliatory. His practical good sense, sound judgment and 
high conscientiousness constituted the prominent features 
of his character ; qualities, if not the most rare, cer- 
tainly the most valuable of the human mind. No man 
has ever appeared upon the theatre of human action 
whose integrity was more incorruptible, or whose prin- 
ciples were less selfish. His ends were always just, his 
means always pure. The wiles of the politician were 



90 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

wholly unknown to him, and his life illustrates the maxim 
that "honesty is the best policy." His knowledge was 
acquired by close observation and profound thought. His 
self-knowledge gave him knowledge of others, his self- 
government enabled him to govern others. He met all 
subjects submitted to his consideration with intelligent 
patriotism, with unerring judgment, with unbending integ- 
rity and with the calmness of a self-possessed nature ; 
disposed of them in accordance with truth and justice. 
There was a beautiful simplicity in his character, and 
his remarkable qualities were blended in wonderful har- 
mony. History furnishes numerous instances of indi- 
viduals distinguished for some peculiar trait, or some 
remarkable attainment, while wanting in other things; 
but Washington had no such distinction ; he possessed 
in common with all great men, the qualities that distin- 
guished them, and rose far above them in the perfect 
purity of his life and character ; this was the crowning 
virtue which rounded out his " genius of character, " in 
which alone he excelled Julius Caesar, and which is as far 
superior to the genius of intellect as the illuminating rays 
of the sun are to the scintillations of the stars. Genius 
of character commended Moses to his God, and gave 
him authority over men. Genius of character enabled 
Confucius, the philosopher and sage to stamp himself 
indelibly upon successive millions of human beings, for 
nearly two thousand five hundred years. To Washing- 
ton's genius of character, our country is indebted for its 
independence, and the world for the highest type of 
christian civilization, that has appeared in this or any 



GEORGE WASHINGTON. 9 1 

Other age. This same transcendent quality elevated 
Washington to the chief magistracy of the freest govern- 
ment in the world. It s-^cured to him the love and 
veneration all good men, the respect and admiration of 
all great men ; his presence visibly impressed all officials 
who approached him ; they were relieved by his absence. 
His two Secretaries, Thomas Jefferson and Alexander 
Hamilton, bowed to the majesty of his virtue. 

His genius of character was felt in the Legislative 
halls, in the council chambers, in the judicial tribunals, in 
the camp — inspiring military ardor, and holding on the 
battle field, the half-clad and half-starved soldiers, with 
the determination " to do or die. " History may boast 
of Julius Caesar, as the " foremost man of all the world ; " 
of Alexander the Great, as having conquered the world, 
before he was thirty, and weeping on the banks of the 
Indus because there were no more worlds to conquer ; of 
the boldness and daring of Hannibal and Napoleon in 
hurling their battalions across the snow-crowned Alps, 
where neither insect nor bird dare wing their way. She 
may boast of the purity of life and character, of the stern 
and inflexible patriotism, and of the determined valor of 
Epaminondas, of Brutus, and of Scipio. She may boast 
of the long line of illustrious heroes whose names adorn 
her pages, while their deeds bless or curse mankind. In 
comparison with George Washington, they all, " all, " 
pale like the morning stars before the rising sun. He 
stands alone upon the rolls of fame without a parallel, 
like some tall pillar in a desert land in majestic loneliness, 



g2 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

upon which the mind dwells with awe and admiration, 
while all around is gloom and solitude and silence. 

Thomas Jefferson, one of the great apostles of freedom, 
and author of the Declaration of Independence, and 
who differed widely from Washington on many political 
questions, bears the following testimony to his character : 
" His integrity was the most pure, his justice the most 
inflexible, I have ever known ; no motives of interest or 
consanguinity, of friendship or hatred, being able to bias 
his decision. He was indeed in every sense of the word 
a wise, a good, and a great man. His temper was natur- 
ally irritable and high-toned; but reflection and resolu- 
tion had obtained a firm and habitual ascendancy over 
it." 

Chief Justice Marshall said of him : " That innate and 
unassuming modesty, which adulation would have 
offended, which the voluntary plaudits of millions could 
not betray into indiscretion, was happily blended with a 
high and correct sense of personal dignity, and with a just 
consciousness of that respect which is due to station. " 

"How grateful," says Lord Brougham, "the reHef which 
the friend of mankind, the lover of virtue experiences, 
when turning from the contemplation of such a character 
(as Napoleon I) his eye rests upon the greatest man of 
our own or any age." 

It will be the duty of the historian and the sage, in all 
ages, to omit no occasion of commemorating this 
illustrious man ; and until time shall be no more, will a 
test of the progress which our race has made in wisdom 
and virtue, be dciived from the veneration paid to the 



GEORGE WASHINGTON. 93 

immortal name of Washington. Paradoxical as it may 
appear, Washington was great in those things in which 
other men are weak, and weak in those things in which 
other men are great. He was great in subduing selfish- 
ness, while others were weak. He was weak in the 
assumption of superior virtue and authority, while 
others were strong. He was indeed a hero of a new 
type, without prototype or antitype. Will he have any 
successful imitators ? 

He was childless, but most happy in his domestic 
relations. His wife was of the same age as himself, 
comely and amiable; she brought him a large fortune, 
presided over his household with punctuality and order, 
received and entertained his guests with gracious hospi- 
tality, and in all respects adorned his official station, and 
cheered his private life. On the death of her son, Colonel 
John Parke Custis, at Yorktown, leaving four children, the 
two youngest, Eleanor Parke Custis (afterward married 
to her cousin Major Lewis), and George Washington 
Parke Custis, were adopted by Washington, and brought 
up as children at Mount Vernon. An original full-length 
statue by Houdon, in the capitol at Richmond, is 
accepted as the standard likeness of Washington. The 
attitude is rather stiff, and the forehead as in most French 
works of art of that period, probably somewhat too retreat- 
ing, A succession of portraits, from that of the elder Peale, 
in 1770, to that of Sharpless, in 1796, exhibit his counte- 
nance, and some of them his person, with various merit 
and success, and through all the change wrought by a 
quarter of a century. 



94 



REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 



To all the other traits of excellence in his character, 
he added profound convictions of religious truth, firm 
faith in an overruling Providence, and reverence for 
the Christian church, of which he was a communicating 
member. 




Julius c^ESAft. 95 



^liapltr 



wo. 



JULIUS Ci^SAR. 

JJJ|aIUS JULIUS C^SAR was born on the 
.^^(^ 12th day of July, 100 years B. C. His 
father of the same name, was an aristocrat. His mother 
was of the family of Aurelius Cotta, also aristocratic. 
From early youth he gave evidence of extraordinary 
capabilities. He learned with the readiness of intuition ; 
his memory was truly wonderful, forgetting nothing. In 
his seventeenth year, he procured a divorce from his wife, 
in order to marry Cornelia, a daughter of Cinna, then a 
leader of the democratic element. His aunt Julia had 
married Marius, another leader of the democratic party. 
Sylla the usurper arid dictator, was at the head of the 
aristocracy, and seeing the superiority of the young 
Caesar, sought to win him, and advised him to repudiate 
his wife, Cornelia. Whether from aftection for his wife, 



96 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

or from the belief that the democracy was the strongest, 
Caesar refused to act upon the advice of Sylla, thereby 
incurring his bitter hostiUty. Sylla took from him his 
wife's dowry, his own property and his office (Priest of 
Jupiter) which he held at that time. Caesar quit Rome, 
and went to Asia Minor ; remaining there until after 
Sylla's death. Upon his return, he devoted himself to 
literature, and especially to the study of eloquence ; and 
with the view of perfecting himself in that art, he set out 
for Rhodes, to receive the instructions of Molo, who had 
been master to Cicero. On his way thither, he was cap- 
tured by pirates, and detained thirty-eight days. He 
consented to pay thirty talents, over $30,000, and was 
released, saying if he ever caught them afterwards, he 
would crucify every mother's son of them. He did pur- 
sue them, captured them, and executed them. He then 
resumed his studies with great energy. In the year 74 
before Christ, hearing that he had been chosen one of 
the pontifices, he returned to Rome, and became what 
we at this day call a politician, or more properly a dema- 
gogue, and excelled all men in that art, as in every other 
to which he directed his attention. In 65 before Christ, 
he was elected to the office of ^dile, which was con- 
nected with the public entertainments, thereby gaining 
the opportunity of expending large amounts of the public 
moneys, which he did lavishly, and also squandered his 
private fortune, leaving him millions in debt. He was 
unscrupulous in financial transactions ; he borrowed all he 
could, and expended all he had. He was appointed 
Governor of Spain, but before his departure his creditors 



JULIUS CiESAR. 97 

seized him, and his friend Crassus, became his security 
for five millions of dollars. Upon his return from Spain 
he formed a coalition with Pompey and Crassus, called 
the triumvirate. While in Spain he waged a cruel war 
against some of the native tribes, for the sole purpose of 
acquiring military fame ; upon the strength of which he 
became a candidate for the repubUc. He was elected 
and administered the government with unexampled vigor. 
His subsequent wars increased his military fame, until he 
was elected dictator, when he ruled with arbitrary and 
despotic power, which resulted in his assassination. 
Judging from his deeds and his writings, from a careful 
examination of his life, and from the profound impres- 
sion made upon his contemporaries, and upon succeed- 
ing generations, Julius Caesar was one of the most extra- 
ordinary men that ever lived, neither entering the world 
nor leaving it according to the ordinary laws of nature. The 
surgeon's knife brought him into the world, the assassin's 
dagger took him out of it. When quite young, Sylla the 
usurper, said, "There is many a Mariusin that stripling." 
When grown to manhood, his personal appearance was 
noble and commanding. He was tall in stature, of a fair 
complexion, and with black eyes, full of expression. His 
constitution v/as originally delicate, but by constant exer- 
cise and abstemious living, he acquired strong and 
vigorous health, and could endure great hardship. He 
was gifted by nature with the most varied talents, and 
was distinguished by extraordinary attainments. He was 
at the same time, a general, a statesman, a law-giver, a 
jurist, an orator, a poet, an historian, a philologist, a 

8 



98 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

mathematician and an architect. He was equally fitted to 
excel in all, and has given proofs that he would have sur- 
passed all other men in any pursuit to which he devoted 
his extraordinary mind. Until he was forty he was 
principally engaged in literary pursuits, and was the 
author of many literary works, most of which are lost. 
His commentaries on the Gallic and civil wars are the 
purest compositions in the Latin tongue. Beside his 
masterly "commentaries," the memoirs of his own life, he 
wrote on grammar and on rhetoric. He wrote tragedies, 
satires and lyrics, he reformed the calender, as well as 
the State, and is represented as the most perfect gentle- 
man of his day. His moral sensibility was not equal to 
his intellectual acuteness, or his force of will, and the 
record of his life is stained by acts of profligacy, by 
cruelty, and a terrible and needless waste of human life. 
Niebuhr calls him a "demoniac man," driven restlessly 
onward, by the impulses of his genius and passions, vastly 
in advance of all his contemporaries. Most of 
the great generals of the world, have been distin- 
guished at an early age. Alexander the Great, 
Hannibal, Frederick of Prussia, and Napoleon, gained 
some of their most brilliant victories under thirty. Caesar 
saw nothing ot war until he was forty, when he appears 
all at once the greatest general the world ever saw. In 
oratory he was inferior only to Cicero, and if he had de- 
voted as much time to that art as Cicero did, he would 
doubtless have surpassed him in that, as m every other 
art. His vivid imagination and extraordinary command 
of language would have made him shine with dazzling 



JULIUS CMSAR. 99 

brilliancy as a poet. The concentrated thought and the 
felicitous expression yeni, vidi, vici, of his famous letter, 
is surpassed only by the words of Moses, "Let there be 
light, and there was light." That he was not more 
drawn towards oratory and poetry was not for the want 
of capacity to master them, but because those mysterious 
impulses, both moral and esthetic in their nature, which 
carry some great minds onward towards those higher and 
more spiritual efforts of the human intellect, did not stir 
his soul. Nature designed him for a man of action, and 
in this he surpassed all men of whom history has pre- 
served anything approaching an accurate record. The 
vicissitudes of his life were as extraordinary as his achieve- 
ments. Now overwhelmed with debt, and now the pos- 
sessor of millions ; now a captive to pirates, and now the 
Emperor of the world, he was moved to the most ex- 
traordinary actions alike by the power of his genius and 
the impulses of his passions. We are not surprised that 
Shakspeare pronounced him the "foremost man of all the 
world." He has been called the lone creative genius of 
the Roman world, the last one that ever rose upon the 
horizon of antiquity. His genius was essentially Roman. 
He was the bright consummate flower of the civilization 
of the mistress of the world — the living, personal embod- 
iment of her greatness. In addition to the marvelous 
powers with which nature endowed him, he was adorned 
with all the accomplishments of the age in which he 
lived. 

Under different circumstances Caesar might have won 
as great a reputation as a man of letters as he has acquired 



lOO REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

as a general and a statesman. He was fully aware that 
a change in the literary language of his countrymen was 
as necessary as in their government and constitution. 
The rude though vigorous dialect of Plautus, or even of 
Varro, was not suited to be the organ of civilization 
throughout a subject world. A wide spread knowledge 
of Greek had made the Romans aware of their own de- 
ficiencies, and the united efforts of all men of culture to 
give form and refinement to the Latin tongue, culminated 
in the glories of the Augustan age. Cicero and Livy, 
Virgil and Horace, have remained as examples of Latin 
style during the whole of the Christian era. The lan- 
guage in which they wrote must have differed widely 
from anything which was spoken by their most cultivated 
contemporaries. It is not unreasonable to feel some 
regret that the cultivated language did not follow a course 
of development more suited to its inherent character, and 
that Lucretius and Caesar were not adopted by the 
rhetoricians of the empire as models for precept and imi- 
tation. The excellence of the Latin language lies in its 
solidity and precision ; its defects lie in a want of light- 
ness and flexibility. Lucretius found it sufficient to ex 
press with admirable clearness very complex philosophical 
reasoning, and Caesar exhibited its excellencies in their 
purest and chastest form. It is a misfortune that the 
Commentaries are not more often studied as a master- 
piece of literature, but are relegated by the irony of for- 
tune to the lower forms of schools. Their style is fault- 
less, not a word is thrown away or used with a doubtful 
meaning, every expression is in its place, and each touch 



JULIUS C^SAR. lOI 

serves to enhance the effect of the whole. Had Caesar 
been writing history instead of military memoirs, he might 
have allowed himself greater freedom of ornament. We 
know from his treatise on grammar (De Analogia), often 
quoted by grammarians, that his success in literature 
was the result of careful study and meditation. As an 
orator he was acknowledged to be second to Cicero 
alone, and he is one of the few men in history who have 
quelled a rebellion by a speech. 




REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 



Cftaptet ^ftm. 




JOHN MARSHALL. 

^HE grandfather of Chief Justice Marshall 
was a native of Wales. He settled in 
Westmoreland County, Virginia, about the year 1730, 
where he married Elizabeth Markhani, a native of 
England. This gentleman's eldest son, Thomas, the 
father of the Chief Justice, inherited the family estate 
called " Forest, " consisting of a few hundred acres of 
poor land in Westmoreland. He removed from this 
county to Fauquier, soon after attaining the age of man- 
hood, and having intermarried with Mary Keith, by 
which he became connected with the Randolphs, he 
settled upon a small farm at a place called German town 
where John Marshall was born. ^The great proprietor of 



JOHN MARSHALL. IO3 

the northern neck of Virginia, including Fauquier 
County, was at that time Lord Fairfax, who gave George 
Washington the appointment of surveyor in the western 
part of his territory. Washington employed Thomas 
Marshall in thr same business. They had been near 
neighbors from birth, associates from boyhood, and were 
always friends. Thomas Marshall, though a planter of 
retired habits and narrow fortune, was a man of great 
energy of character and vigor of intellect. 

When Washington received command of the American 
armies in the war of the revolution, his friend and asso- 
ciate. Colonel Marshall, left his estate and large family, 
and embarked in the same cause. He was placed in 
command ot the Third Virginia Regiment in the Conti- 
nental establishment, and served with distinction under 
the immediate order of Washington, durmg the darkest 
and most eventful period of the war. This regiment 
performed very severe duties during the campaign of 
1776 and 1777. It was present under the orders of 
Marshall at the battle of Trenton, and subsequently on 
the bloody field of Brandywine, where father and son 
served in different regiments, and each distinguished 
himself by good conduct and heroism. 

Though without the advantages of an early education, 
Colonel Marshall was a man not only of great native 
endowments, but of considerable mental culture. He 
was a practical surveyor, adequately acquainted with the 
mathematics and astronomy, and famiHarly conversant 
with history, poetry and general literature, of which 
he possessed most of the standard works in the 



I04 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

language; and these were the means, which un- 
der his fostering attention served to complete all 
the early education his distinguished son received. The 
care and attention thus bestowed were neither lost nor 
forgotten. Long after that son had arrived at the high 
station which he so long adorned, he was accustomed, in 
private and familiar conversation, to speak of his father 
in terms of affectionate and reverential admiration. "My 
father," he would say, "was a far abler man than any of 
his sons. To him 1 owe the solid foundation of all my 
own success in life." Such was the stock from which 
John Marshall sprang. He was born at Germantown, 
Virginia, on the 24th of September, 1755, and was the 
eldest son of a family of fifteen children. A few years 
after his birth his father removed his family to the then 
frontier settlements, thirty miles further west, and located 
in the mountains east of the Blue Ridge, at a place called 
the "Hollow," in a country thinly peopled and destitute 
of schools, but remarkable for the salubrity of its atmos- 
phere and the picturesque beauty of its mountain scenery. 
It was a place admirable for the formation of a physical 
constitution, and for the development of its powers by 
athletic exercises and sports. Here the son remained 
until his fourteenth year, laying the foundation of that 
vigorous health which attended him through life, and 
deriving from his father all the training in letters which 
he received up to that period. ' He developed even in 
his younger years, a remarkable aptitude for study. At 
an age when most children are engaged in those simple 
elementary tasks, which make up the routine of school 



JOHN MARSHALL. 105 

boy life, he had already acquired, we are told, a taste for 
reading poetry and history, and was fond of amusing his 
leisure hours by a study of the old English authors. 

Though it may seem surprising in our day that the 
library of a plain, uneducated planter, in one of the back 
settlements of Virginia, before the Revolution, should 
have been found to contain Milton, Shakspeare, Dry- 
den, Pope, and the principal classic authors of the lan- 
guage, yet such we are assured, was the fact, and the 
mind of young Marshall was thus from boyhood enabled 
to familiarize itself with the thoughts of those great mas- 
ters of the poetic art. At the age of twelve he had 
transcribed the whole of Pope's Essay on Man, and some 
of his moral essays, and had committed to memory many 
of their most interesting passages. ^ 

Subsequent to this period, and before attaining the age 
of manhood, he yielded to the seductive influence of the 
muses, so far as to suffer his feet to stray into the flowery 
but hazardous paths of poetic composition. This taste 
for general literature, and especially for works of the 
imagination and poetry, remained with Marshall through 
life. Judge Story dwells upon the fact with peculiar sat- 
isfaction. He would read, he says, with intense interest, 
all the higher literature of modern times, especially those 
departments which had been the favorite studies of his 
youth, and would kindle with enthusiasm at the names 
of the great novelists and poets of the age. These elegant 
amusements. Judge Story evidently seems to regard with 
Sir James Mackintosh, as the refuge of men of genius 
from "the vulgarity and irritation of business." The 



Io6 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

union of such a taste with that severe logic and closeness 
of thought which belong to the judicial character, he 
remarks, is ''far less uncommon in the highest class of 
minds than slight observers are apt to suppose." It must 
be admitted that many illustrious examples, besides Mar- 
shall's, might be mentioned to verify the remark. Lord 
Mansfield, the friend of the poet Pope, was distinguished 
for his classic attainments and literary tastes. When he 
first came to town, according to Johnson, "he drank 
champaign with the wits ;" and it is not certain but that 
he always preferred the society of scholars and men of 
genius to that of his professional brethren. A more. 

striking example still is the case of Judge Story himself 
He wrote and published a poem, after he came to the 
bar, the success of which was probably not commensurate 
with its merits, or at least with the author's expectations, 
for we find him some years afterwards buying up and 
destroying all the copies that had escaped the hands of 
the trunk-makers. It is not improbable that, if "The 
Power of SoUtude" had passed safely and successfully 
through the hands of the critics, the Commentaries on 
the Constitution might not have been written. Be this 
as it may, the muses still continued to bring its author 
"delicious dreams," long after he attained professional 
eminence; and he could never, not even after he had 
taken his seat by the side of Marshall on the bench, bring 

himself to confess that 

" The dreams of Pindus and the Aonian Maid, 
Invite no more. " 

I Young Marshall was sent from home at the age of 



JOHN MARSHALL. lO/ 

fourteen, and placed under the tuition of a clergyman 
residing in Westmoreland, named Campbell, a gentleman 
of great respectability and learning. Here he remained 
a year, having for one of his fellow-students, Jatnes 
Monroe, afterwards President of the United States. 
Returnmg home, he continued his studies another year 
under the care of a Scotch gentleman named Thompson, 
just settled in the parish as pastor, and who resided in 
his father's family. At the end of this year, we are told, 
he had just commenced reading Horace and Livy. 
The two years of classical instruction are all which the 
Chief Justice ever received^J He never graduated at a 
college, though by his own industry and with the aid of 
a grammar and dictionary, he subsequently managed to 
acquire a respectable knowledge of the Latin classics, and 
it has been well remarked that his attainments in learn- 
ing were '* nursed by the solitary vigils of his own 
genius." But these vigils were soon broken in upon 
by the stirring events of the revolution. Young Mar- 
shall was entering his eighteenth year when the contest 
between the Colonists and Great Britain commenced. It 
found him engaged in studying the classics, and in read- 
ing by turns poetry and history, and the Commentaries 
of Blackstone. These pursuits, though congenial to the 
studious habits of his mind, were not suffered to engross 
his attention to the exclusion of the exciting political 
topics of the day. On the contrary, he entered into the 
controversy, with a zeal which had not yet become tem- 
pered by the sober lessons of wisdom and experience. 
Nor did his zeal waste itself in noisy and boisterous de- 



Io8 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

clamation, or in the mere expression of speculative 
opinion ; for he was among the first to set the example of 
prompt, energetic, decisive action. The thrilling words 
of Patrick Henry — " We inust fight! An appeal to arms 
and the God of Hosts is all that is left us, " — had 
scarcely fallen from the lips of the great orator, ere we 
find John Marshall, laying aside his Horace and Pope, 
his Lyttelton and Blackstone, to acquire the rudiments 
of military exercise, and actively engaged in training a 
militia company in the neighborhood. His first appear- 
ance after the intelligence of the battle of Lexington had 
been received, was as an officer of a militia company in 
Fauquier County, and is described by a venerable kins- 
man, who was himself an eye-witness of the occurences 
he relates; and this description is so graphic, and so full 
of interest, that I cannot refrain from transcribing it in 
the words in which it is written: " It was in May, 1776. 
He was then a youth of nineteen. The muster-field was 
some twenty miles distant from the court-house, and in 
a section of the country peopled by tillers of the earth. 
Rumors of the occurrences near Boston, had circulated 
with the effect of alarm and agitation, but without the 
means of ascertaining the truth, for not a newspaper 
was printed nearer than Williamsburg, nor was one taken 
within the bounds of the militia company, though large. 
The captain had called the company together and was 
expected to attend, but did not. John Marshall had 
been appointed a lieutenant to it. His father had for- 
merly commanded it. Soon after Lieutenant Marshall's 
appearance on the ground, those who knew him clustered 



JOHN MARSHALL. I09 

about him to greet him, others from curiosity, and to hear 
the news." He proceeded to inform the company, that 
the Captain would not be there, and that he had been 
appointed Lieutenant instead of i better ; — that he had 
come to meet them as fellow-soldiers who were likely to 
be called to defend their country, and their own rights 
and liberties, mvaded by the British; — that there had 
been a battle at Lexington, in Massachusetts, between 
the British and Americans, in which the Americans were 
victorious, but that more fighting was expected; that 
soldiers were called for, and that it was time to brighten 
their fire-arms and learn to use them in the field ; and 
that if they would fall into a single line, he would show 
them the new manual exercise, for which purpose l:e had 
brought his gun — bringing it up to his shoulder. The 
sergeants put the men in line, and their bugle-man 
presented himself in front, to the right." The same 
excellent authority goes on to describe the personal 
appearance and figure of Marshall, and the simple and 
familiar manner of his intercourse with the men whom 
he had undertaken to instruct in the "new manual exer- 
cise." The picture is striking, and graphic; I shall 
hereafter compare it with another, drawn by a different 
hand, of the same John Marshall, as he appeared, not as 
Lieutenant of Militia, but as Chief Justice of the United 
States : "He was about six feet high, straight and rather 
slender, of dark complexion — showing little, if any, rosy 
red, yet good health, the outline of the face nearly a 
circle, and within that eyes dark to blackness, strong and 
penetrating, beaming with intelligence and good nature ; 



no REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

an upright forehead, rather low, was terminated in a 
horizontal line, by a mass of raven black hair, of unusual 
thickness and strength. The features of the face were in 
harmony with this ou'line, and the temples fully devel- 
oped. The result of this combination was interesting and 
very agreeable. The body and limbs indicated agility, 
rather than strength, in which, however, he was by no 
means deficient. He wore a purple, or pale blue hunt- 
ing-shirt, and trowsers of the same material, fringed with 
white. A round, black hat, mounted with the buck's 'ail 
for a cockade, crowned the figure and the man. " He 
went through the manual exercise by word and motion, 
deliberately pronounced and performed in the presence 
of the company, before he required the men to imitate 
him ; and then proceeded to exercise them with the most 
perfect temper. 

Never did man possess a temper more happy, or if 
otherwise, more subdued or better disciplined. "After a 
few lessons, the company were dismissed, and informed 
that if they wished to hear more about the war, and would 
form a circle around him, he would tell them what he 
understood about it. The circle was formed, and he 
addressed the company for something like an hour. I 
remember, for I was near him, that he spoke, at the close 
of his speech, of the minute battaUon about to be raised, 
and said he was going into it, and expected to be joined 
by many of his hearers. He then challenged an acquaint- 
ance, to a game of quoits, and they closed the day with 
foot-races and other athletic exercises, at which there was 
no betting. He had walked ten miles to the muster field 



JOHN MARSHALL. Ill 

and returned the same distance on foot to his father's 
house, at Oak Hill, where he arrived a little after sunset." 
Such is the life-like picture which a cotemporary and 
kinsman has left of the Chief Justice, as he appeared 
upon the threshhold of early manhood. One cannot 
help being struck with its truthfulness and simplicity ; 
a walk of ten miles from Oak Hill, in a blue 
hunting-shirt and buck-tail cockade; a frank, friendly, 
and hearty greeting with his comrades, a drill in 
the " manual exercise " — a familiar talk about 
the war — foot-races, and a game of quoits, at 
which "there was no betting," make up the promment 
points of the picture. And it may here be added, that 
this admirable simplicity of manners — nay, the very 
tastes and habits of his early manhood, remained with 
him through life. Thus he never lost his fondness for 
those field sports and atheletic exercises, which in youth 
laid the foundation of that robust healtn which he con- 
tinued to enjoy to a green old age ; nor did he disdain 
his favorite game of quoits, eve>i when he had been 
placed at the head of the Federal Judiciary. The Chief 
Justice of the United States never ceased to be John 
Marshall. 

As a member of the Virginia Convention, he advocated 
the adoption of the proposed Federal Constitution in 
several powerful speeches, which contributed more to 
its adoption than those of any other member, except 
James Madison. He was offered several high positions, 
but declined them. At the special request of Gen. 
Washington he became a candidate for congress, and 



112 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

was elected in 1799. He made a great speech in con- 
gress, defending President John Adams for his surrender 
of Thomas Nash (aUas Robbins) who was claimed by the 
British Government as a fugitive from justice. This 
speech settled forever the question whether such cases 
should be decided by the executive or the judiciary 
I " That argument, " says R. W. Griswold, " deserves to 
be ranked among the most dignified displays of human 
intellect. " A deep impression was made upon all 
present, by this speech, and a profound silence prevailed. 
During its continuance, John Randolph, who was sitting 
by a northern gentleman, who had frequently rallied him 
for thinking some men great simply because they were 
Virginians, broke the silence by saying, " Do you think 
John Marshall a great man, because he is a Virginian? " 
Mr. Randolph, opposed as he was to Marshall's political 
opinions, and rarely as he eulogized any man, said of 
him: " No one admires more than I do, the extraordi- 
nary powers of Marshall's mind ; no one respects more 
his amiable deportment in private life ; he is the most 
unpretending and unassuming of men ; his abiHties and 
virtues render him an ornament not only to Virginia but 
to our nature. " 'S Again says Mr. Griswold, " To one 
who cannot follow his great judgments in which at the 
same time the depths of legal wisdom are disclosed, and 
the limits of human reason measured, the language 
of just eulogy must wear an appearance of extravagance. " 
" In his own profession he stands for the reverence of the 
wise, rather than for the enthusiasm of the many. " Of 
his expositions of constitutional law, Judge Story says 



JOHN MARSHALL. II3 

" If all others of the Chief-Justice's judicial arguments 
had perished, his luminous judgments on these occasions 
would have given an enviable immortality to his name. " 
i His father Thomas, and Capt. Philip Slaughter's father, 
James, were neighbors and friends. Their sons John and 
Philip were about the same age, grew up together on 
terms of intimacy and friendship, and went into the Revo- 
lutionary army together, sharing its trials, its privations 
and its dangers. Their friendship continued during 
their lives, not in profession and in form merely, but in 
sincerity and in reality. They never addressed each other 
except as John and Phil. ; and on one occasion as Phil, 
was passing through John's neighborhood on important 
business, he accidently met with John, who took him to 
his house and detained him several days, when Phil, 
informed him he^was going to borrow some money from 
a money lender. John inquired how much he wanted, 
Phil, said he wanted $5,000; John immediately retired, 
and in a few minutes, brought him a check on the bank 
for the amount. Phil, declined taking it, saying he did 
not know when he could return it. John insisted, say- 
ing, "secure it to my grand children and I will be satis- 
fied. His grandson John told me he collected that 
money after the death of both parties, land that nothing 
could have induced him to do it before. I John Marshall, 
Major Gabriel Long, and Capt. Phil. Slaughter, were 
invited by the State of Virginia to accompany General 
Lafayette through the State, the State paying their 
expenses. I accompanied the party and was present at 

the reception of General Lafayette at Yorktown, under 

9 



1I4 REMINISCENCES OF DISTlNGUlSHEt) MEN. 

a triumphal arch erected on the spot where Corn- 
walHs surrendered his sword, and thus virtually terminated 
the war. From Yorktown the party proceeded to 
Williamsburg, the ancient seat of government, thence to 
Richmond the present seat of government, and at that 
time the residence of Marshall. \ While at Richmond I 
spent several days in the p^or of the hotel listening 
with the deepest interest to the conversations of 
John Marshall, Major Gabriel Long, Captain Phil. 
Slaughter and Lafayette. '■'■Rari nantes in gurgite vasto." 
On one occasion, I was in the Supreme Court room, at 
Washington city, the Court being in session, and the 
Chief Justice presiding ; when I addressed him a note 
desiring to know when and where I could see him, for 
the purpose of obtaining his testimony to estab- 
lish the claim of Captain Philip Slaughter, then 
pending on Congress, for revolutionary services. He 
replied on the back of my note, "immediately, in the 
recess behind the bench." I saw him retire from the 
bench, and I went round to meet him. He received me 
with both hands saying, "how is Phil.?" I replied that 
he was very ill, and not expected to live. He was visibly 
aftected, and said, "I hope he will recover." He gave 
all the information in his power, and the claim was estab- 
lished.! 

There have been many anecdotes published in the 

world, illustrating the kindness of the Chief Justice's heart, 

and the simplicity of his manners ; from what I knew of 

^ him I have no doubts of the truth of many of them. His 

usual mode of traveling was in what was called in old 



JOHN MARSHALL. II5 

Virginia a stick gig. It had but two wheels and two 
shafts, designed for one horse; the seat was a common 
wooden chair, with iron legs, fastened to the shafts very 
near the horse. If the horse stumbled and broke a shaft, 
the driver was pitched forward on the horse's heels ; and 
if the horse was vicious and kicked, he would strike the 
chair on the under side, and throw the driver backward 
over the wheels. The old chief was never in much 
danger : first, because he never drove out of a walk ; and 
secondly, because his horses were always too poor for such 
pranks as kicking their heels in the air. He inquired of 
his servant Tom, "how it was that Colonel Pickett's 
horses were always fat, and his always lean ?" Tom, who 
was a little staggered at first, knowing that the condition 
of his master's horses was the result of his own negligence, 
replied, "You know, Marse John, that Colonel Pickett is a 
fat man, his wife is a fat woman, his servant Dick, is a fat 
man, and his horses all fat ; now you is a lean man, old 
missus is a lean woman, I is a lean man, and the horses 
all lean. I tell you what it is Marse John — fat and lean 
run in families. The old chief said there might be some- 
thing in that^^ 

Once he arrived in his stick gig at a hotel in Win-l 
Chester, Virginia, weaned with the ride, oppressed with 
heat and covered with dust. He met in the sitting-room 
five or SIX young gentlemen, discussing very learnedly the 
philosophical speculations of Plato in regard to the soul 
of the universe as being the source of heat, and light and 
life. They discussed also the doctrine of Leibnitz, that 
the universe was composed of eternal, self-existing, inde- 



Il6 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

pendent particles of matter called monads, and that 
affinity was the cause of the various modifications, 
cognizable by our senses. Religion was scouted as a 
thing unworthy of belief, because it was founded on 
miracles ; and Hume said the lesser miracle should be 
believed, and that it was a much less miracle that wit- 
nesses should he, than that the laws of nature should be 
violated. Having satisfied themselves of their profound 
learning, they proposed to have some sport with the old 
chief who had been silent the whole time. One of them 
said to him, "my old codger, what do you think about 
these matters?" The old chief said they were very import- 
ant matters, and he had not thought as much upon them 
as he ought to have done ; but such crude thoughts as 
he had he would give them. He commenced as he would 
have done to babes in knowledge, staiang that creation 
must have had a creator ; that the creator must also 
have been omnipotent, to have filled unlimited space 
with worlds ; that he must have been all-wise to have 
produced universal harmony ; that he must have all 
goodness to have provided the means of happiness for all 
his creatures." One of the young men suspecting he and 
his companions were sold, retired very quietly to the 
adjoining room and inquired of the landlord, "who that 
old man was?" The landlord informed him he was 
Chief Justice Marshall. The young man returned, whis- 
pered to his companions, and very shortly the old chief 
\ was without an audience. 

Having referred to Judge Marshall's judicial services, 
his opinions and his public character, it is proper that I 



JOHN MARSHALL. 117 

should speak of his domestic and social virtues, and of 
that happy combination of faculties which threw a chaim 
around his fireside and over his intercourse in private 
life. I might speak of that rare combination of virtue 
and wisdom which his private as well as his public life 
manifested'; — of that wise and considerate propriety of 
conduct ; — that natural dignity.of deportment ; — that love 
ofjtruth and deep sense of moral and religious obligation ; 
— that unaffected modesty ; — that simplicity of character, 
manners, dress and deportment; — that deep sensibility 
and tenderness ; — that ardent love of home and attach- 
ment to the pleasures of the domestic circle ; that respect, 
courtesy and kindness which he always manifested for 
the female sex ; — that absence of all selfish feeling ; — 
that benevolence, and that kindly charity which was not 
only a principle and rule of Hfe, but an pinnate sentiment 
of the heart. All these might be spoken of in terms of 
unquaHfied respect and admiration ; but the task has been 
already done by the hand of another, his intimate com- 
panion and friend Judge Story, and in a manner which 
none may hope to equal, or even to imitate. In bring- 
ing this sketch to a close, however, I cannot refrain from 
introducing the following tribute to his domestic virtues, 
from the pen of a venerable kinsmen, as preserved by 
one of his eulogists, Hon. Horace Binney ; a tribute 
as full of affectionate tenderness as it is of a touching 
simplicity and genuine truthfulness: " He had no frays 
in boyhood. He had no quarrels or outbreakings in 
manhood. He was the composer of strifes. He spoke 
ill of no man. He meddled not with their affairs. He 



Il8 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

viewed their worst deeds through the medium of charity. 
He had eight sisters and six brothers, with all of whom 
from youth to age, his intercourse was marked by the 
utmost kindness and affection ; and, although his eminent 
talents, high public character and acknowledged useful- 
ness could not fail to be a subject of pride and admiration 
to all of them, there is no one of his numerous rela- 
tives, who has had the happiness of a personal associa- 
tion with him, in whom his purity, simplicity and affec- 
tionate benovolence did not produce a deeper, and more 
cherished impression than all the achievements of his 
powerful intellect. " And to this may be added the last, 
perhaps the most generous and affecting tribute of that 
devoted associate, who mourned his loss, not as a friend 
only, but as a brother ; a tribute less to be valued on 
account of any poetic beauty than as an evidence of that 
warm affection and that undying and reverential 
admiration which Story never ceased to entertain for 
Marshall. The lines, written but a few months after the 
death of the Chief-Justice, were intended as an inscrip- 
tion for a cenotaph : 

" To Marshall reared — the great, the good, the wise, 

Born for all ages, honored in all skies ; 
His was the fame to mortals rarely given, 

Begun on earth but fixed in aim on Heaven. 
Genius and learning and consummate skill, 

Moulding each thought, obedient to will ; 
Affections pure as e'er warmed human breast,. 

And love in blessing others doubly blest ; 
Virtue unspotted, uncorrupted truth, 

Gentle in age, and beautiful in youth . 
These were his bright possessions. These had power 

To charm through life and cheer his dying hour, 
All these are perished! No! but snatchod from time 

To bloom afresh in yonder sphere sublime. 
Kind was the doom (the fruit was ripe) to die — 

Mortal is clothed with immortality. " 



JOHN MARSHALL. II9 

Chief Justice Marshall, at the age of seventy-four years, 
was elected a member of the Convention which assembled 
early in 1829, to revise the Constitution of his native 
State. It has been well remarked that a spectacle of 
greater dignity than this Convention, has rarely been 
exhibited. It was composed of the most eminent citizens 
of Virginia — some of them indeed the most eminent and 
illustrious of living American statesmen — the record of 
whose public services reached back to a period before the 
foundation of the government, and whose histories were 
interwoven with the history of the Republic. Such were 
the two venerable ex-Presidents of the United States, 
James Madison and James Monroe. These, with Mar- 
shall, might well be called the Nestors of the Convention ; 
for each of them, like the Pylian sage, and the Grecian 
chiefs before the walls of Troy, had survived two genera- 
tions of men, and was standing now among a third, to 
enlighten and instruct by the wisdom of years and expe- 
rience. Among their associates were the late President 
Tyler, the late Associate Justice of the Supreme Court, 
Philip P. Barbour, Henry B. Giles, lattleton W. Tazewell, 
Abel P. Upshur, besides many other gentlemen, who have 
subsequently distinguished themselves, and earned an 
honorable fame in the service of their State and country. 
It had been well intended to call Mr. Madison to preside 
over the Convention, but his advanced age and physical 
infirmities induced him to decline. Mr. Monroe was 
then unanimously selected, and was conducted to the 
chair by Madison and Marshall. I cannot under- 
take here to follow the course of the proceedings of the 



120 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

Convention, or to allude even to the prominent subjects 
of its discussions. The debates were, at times, very ani- 
mated, and always exceedingly able. A full report of 
them has been published, comprising a volume of nine 
hundred closely printed pages.* The Chief Justice, though 
not a frequent, much less a tedious speaker, occasionally 
mingled in these debates, and spoke with a directness 
and an earnest sincerity which commanded the respect, if 
it did not carry conviction to the understandings of his 
hearers. It is said that one of the most beautiful features 
of the scene was the reverence manifested for Chief Justice 
Marshall. The gentleness of his temper, the purity of 
his motives, the sincerity of his convictions, and his wis- 
dom, were confessed by all. Though members might differ 
from him in judgment, no harshness or asperity of language 
was suffered to mingle with the reply which his argu- 
ment elicited. He spoke upon the two great questions 
which divided the convention, namely, the basis of rep- 
resentation and the tenure of the judicial office, and with 
especial earnestness and feeling upon the latter. In this 
debate the judicial act passed by congress in 1802, 
restoring the former circuit system, and thereby abolish- 
ing the offices of certain judges, was touched upon. 
The views expressed by the Chief Justice on this subject 
were not concurred in by some of the prominent gentle- 
men in the Convention. His remarks were replied to by 
Mr. Tazewell and Mr. Giles, but by both with the 
utmost courtesy, and respect, especially the latter, who, 
forgetting past differences of opinion, expressed the 
highest personal regard for his venerable associate. The 



JOHN MARSHALL. 12 1 

projected constitution contained a provision that Judges 
of the Superior Court should hold their offices during 
good behavior. The Chief-Justice proposed to add a 
clause guarding against such a construction as that of the 
act of congress referred to, which by repealing the law 
establishing the court, dissolved the tenure of the judge's 
office and discharged him upon the world. In the view of 
Marshall, this was incompatible with the absolute inde- 
pendence of the judiciary. He spoke upon this question 
with earnestness and emphasis — almost, says one, with 
the authority of an apostle. " The argument of the 
gentlemen, " said he " goes to prove not only that there 
is no such thing as judicial mdependence, but that there 
ought to be no such thing : that it is unwise and improvi- 
dent to make the tenure of the judges office to contmue 
during good behavior. I have grown old in the opinion, 
that there is nothing more deai to Virginia, or ought to 
be more dear to her statesmen, and that the best interests 
of the country are secured by it. Advert, sir, to the 
duties of judge. He has to pass between the govern- 
ment, and the man whom that government is prosecut- 
ing — between the most powerful individual in the 
community, and the poorest and most unpopular. 
It is of the last importance that, in the performance of 
these duties, he should observe the utmost fairness. 
Need I press the necessity of this ? Does not every 
man feel that his own personal security, and the security 
of his property depend upon that fairness ? The judicial 
department comes home in its effects to every man's 
fireside ; it passes on his property, his reputation, his life 



122 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

his all. Is it not to the last degree important, that he 
should be rendered perfectly and completely independ- 
ent, with nothing to control him, but God and his con- 
science ? I have always thought, from my earliest 
youth till now, that the greatest scourge an angry heaven 

Lever inflicted upon an ungrateful and a sinning people, 
was an ignorant, a corrupt, or a dependent judiciary. " 

The venerable Chief Justice presided, for the last time, 
in the Supreme Court, at the session of 1835. -^^ ^^<^ 
now entered upon his eightieth year, and was still in 
the enjoyment of tolerable health, and in the full poses- 
sion of his mental faculties. The health of the Chief 
Justice began visibly to fail toward the close of the term. 
Early in March Judge Story writes : " He still possesses 
his intellectual powers in very high vigor, but his physi- 
cal health is manifestly on the decline. " And yet not- 
withstanding bodily weakness, and almost unremitting 
pain, he continued to bear up with an uncomplaining 
spirit ; and though the loss of his wife visibly and deeply 
affected him, he maintained, to outward view at least, 
his habitual calmness and serenity of temper. At the 
close of the session of the court he returned to his resi- 
dence in Richmond. Here he was seized with a serious 
and alarmmg illness. ( Early in June, however, he got 
better and continued to improve ; so much so as to receive 
the visits of his friends, and indeed to inspire temporary 
hopes of his recovery. Among those who had an inter- 
view with him at this period was Chancellor Kent, then 
on a visit to Virginia It was soon apparent, however, 
that this favorable prospect was delusive. His constitu- 



JOHN MARSHALL. I 23 

tion had become shattered, so that but little hopes were 
now entertained of anything but mere temporary relief. 
On the advice of his friends he consented to be taken to 
Philadelphia, in the hopes of obtaining, as upon a former 
occasion, some aid from the distinguished medical skill 
of that city. He was accompanied by three of his sons, 
and during the brief remnant of his days passed in that 
city, was attended by them, and by many of his valued 
friends, among whom was his brother on the bench, Vlr. 
Justice Baldwin, who Hke all his associates, entertained 
for the Chief Justice a respect and affection amounting al 
most to reverence. The death of his eldest son who was 
killed at Baltimore by an unfortunate accident, a few days 
before his father's decease, was concealed from the Chief 
Justice, and everything that considerate affection and 
kindness could prompt, was done to smooth his passage 
to the tomb. He was conscious of his approaching 
end, and with his faculties unimpaired to the last, expired 
on Monday, the 6th of July, 1835, having nearly 
completed his eightieth year. 

Previous to this period. Judge Story, in a letter to his 
wife alludes to the effect on the mind of Marshall of 
his recent affliction: " On going into the Chief 
Justice's room this morning I found him in tears. 
He had but just finished writing out for me some 
lines of General Burgoyne, of which he spoke to me last 
evening as eminently beautiful and affecting. I asked 
him to change the purpose and address them to you' 
which he instantly did ; and you will hnd them accom- 
panying this. I saw at once he had been shedding tears 



124 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

over the memory of his own wife ; and he has said to me 
several times during the term, that the moment he relaxes 
from business he feels exceedingly depressed, and rarely 
goes through a night without weeping over his departed 
wife. She must have been a very extraordinary woman 
so to have attached him ; and I thmk he is the most 
extraordinary man I ever saw, for the depth and tender- 
ness of his feelings." 

I cannot vouch for the accuracy of the following anec- 
dote of the chancellor's interview with Chief Justice 
Marshall, chronicled in the Richmond papers of the day. 
Kent, it is said, introduced himself, and observing that 
"he had heard of the Chief Justice's indisposition," added, 
"that not knowing whether he should see him in the next 
world, he was resolved to have that pleasure in this." 



THOMAS JEFFERSON. 12^ 



Vi four. 



THOMAS JEFFERSON. 

•^^■■|M|Ie[^HE next of our distinguished statesmen of 
t'^lgJiiiftill^ ^hom I have some reminiscences, is the 
illustrious author of the Declaration of Independence. 
Thomas Jefiferson, LLD., third President of the United 
States, was born m Albermarle county, Virginia, April 13, 
(N. S.) 1743. His family, of Welch extraction, was settled 
in Virginia before 16 19, in which year, his ancestor was 
a member of the Assembly, in the first legislative body 
ever convened in America. His father, Peter Jefferson, 
a surveyor and planter, was a man of extraordinary 
physical strength and sound intelligence, a public-spirited 
citizen, and valuable man, who served his country as 
public surveyor, as colonel, and as a member of the 
Legislature. 



126 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

Peter Jefferson married, in 1738, jane, daughter of 
Isham Randolph, and grand daughter of the founder of 
the Virginia Randolphs, by whom he had nine children, 
Thomas being his third child and eldest son. In 1757, 
Peter died, leaving a widow and eight children, the oldest 
seventeen years, the youngest twenty two months, 
Thomas being a school boy of fourteen. The family 
inherited nineteen hundred acres and thirty slaves ; from 
the product of which, Thomas was enabled to attend 
William and Mary College, and study law, thus fulfilling 
the fondest wish of his father, and obeying one of his last 
injunctions. He loved to think that this was his father's 
dying command, and he used to say in his old age, that 
if he had to choose between the estate, or the education 
his father had given him, he would have chosen the 
education. He entered college in 1760, remained two 
years ; began the study of the law at Williamsburg, under 
George Wythe, in 1763, and in 1767, being twenty-four 
years of age, he was admitted to the bar. As a student 
he was industrious, resolute, moral and intelligent. He 
was fortunate in his mathematical Professor, Small, a 
friend of Erasmus Darwin ; also, in the learned George 
Wythe, who directed the legal studies of Chief Justice 
Marshall and Henry Clay. Under the influence of these 
liberal minds, he investigated the sources of law, the 
origin of liberty, and the gradual establishment of equal 
rights, extending his researches into remote antiquity, and 
becoming one of the most accomplished men of his time. 
He acquired skill upon the violin, sometimes practicing 
three hours a day, and was a close observer, and student 



THOMAS JEFFERSOiSr. tz'j 

of nature. He obtained at once, a large and profitable 
practice at the bar, which he held for eight years, until 
he was drawn into public life, by the conflict between 
the colonies and Great Britain. From sixty-eight cases 
in his first year, he was employed in four hundred and 
thirty cases in his fourth year, and his income at the bar 
is estimated at five hundred and fifty pounds sterling, by 
which he increased his estate to five thousand acres of 
land. He married, January i, 1772, Martha Skelton, a 
young, beautiful and childless widow, daughter and 
heiress of a leading lawyer of Virginia, John Wayles, 
whose death the next year, doubled Jefferson's estate. 

Elected a member of the House of Burgesses in 1769, 
he served in that body till the Revolution, a firm sup- 
porter of liberal measures, and noted for his disapproval 
of slavery ; with Patrick Henry and the Lee's, he was a 
leader of the party in opposition to the British King, 
though strongly attached to the mother country. He 
took his seat as a member of the Continental Congress, 
June 21, 1775, the day when the news of the battle of 
Bunker Hill reached Philadelphia, and Washington left 
that city to take command of the army at Cambridge. 

Seldom joining in debate, for he was no orator, he 
acquired great influence by his courtesy, his readiness in 
composition, his knowledge of law and usage, his general 
information, his moderation of tone, and his warm devo- 
tion to the country's cause. After serving on several 
leading committees, and drawing important papers 
he was chosen to draft the Declaration of Independence, 
which after three days' debate and extensive amendments, 



128 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

was adopted and signed on Thursday afternoon, July 4th, 
1776. In September of the same year, he resumed his 
seat in the Virginia Legislature, where, in conjunction 
with George Wythe and James Madison, he spent three 
years in adapting the laws of Virginia to the new order 
of things, and in other patriotic labors. He effected the 
abolition of entail and primogeniture, and drew the laws — 
the first ever passed by a legislature or adopted by a gov- 
ernment — which secured perfect religious freedom. His 
scheme for the establishment of common schools and for 
the abolition of slavery, though warmly supported by the 
liberal members, failed. June ist, 1779, he succeeded 
Patrick Henry as Governor of Virginia, an office which 
he resigned after holding it two years, during which he 
ably co-operated with Washington in defending the 
country. One of his own estates was ravaged and plun- 
dered by Cornwallis, and his house at Monticello was 
held for some days by Tarleton's Cavalry, Jefferson him- 
self narrowly escaping capture. September 6th, 1782, 
his wife died, leaving three children, of six to whom she 
had given birth. Distracted with grief, he now accepted 
an appointment as plenipotentiary to France, which he 
had declined in 1776. Before sailing, he served for some 
weeks in Congress at Annapolis, where he succeeded in 
carrying a bill establishing our present system of decimal 
currency — one of the most useful of his public services. 

Reaching Paris in June, 1784, he remained until Octo- 
ber, 1789. "You replace Dr. Franklin", said the Count 
de Vergennes to the new minister. "I succeed," was Mr. 
Jefferson's reply, no one can replace him." 



THOMAS JEFFERSON. 1 29 

I visited Mr. Jefferson in 1824, at his beautiful resi 
dence, Monticello, near Shadwell, where he was born, in 
the County of Albermarle and State of Virginia. Mon- 
ticello is the eastern terminus of the South-west moun- 
tain, a spur of the Blue Ridge, and from it to the north 
east, east, and south-east, is presented a panorama of 
mountain, dale, and forest, of unequaled beauty. Not 
the least interesting feature in the landscape is the Uni- 
versity, founded and nurtured through the influence of 
Mr. Jefferson. It was the work of his manhood, it was 
the pet of his age. 

Mountains in all ages have been deemed holy places 
and have been the scenes of great events. On Mount 
Ararat rested the ark, the means and emblem of human 
salvation. On Mount Moriah Abraham was commanded 
to sacrifice his own son, emblematic of a still greater 
sacrifice. From Mount Sinai was promulgulated the law 
of the Most High. From Mount Pisgah the enraptured 
eye beheld the land flowing with milk and honey. The 
" Sermon on the Mount " was preached in love to a 
fallen race The Savior of mankind was transfigured on 
a Mount. He expiated their sins on another, and from 
yet another, he ascended to Heaven. The lovers of 
poetry and song pay their homage at Parnassus, and the 
disciples of liberty make pilgrimages to Monticello. 

Mr. Jefferson was the most accomplished man I ever 
saw, in mind, manner, and person. His mind was far- 
reaching, all embracing, almost intuitive, and struggled 
to attain what no mind ever accomplished ; to grasp all 

the sciences. In his knowledge of the genius and the char- 

10 



130 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED ME^f. 

acter of his countrymen, and of the governmental institu- 
tions best adapted to their wants ; in short, as an Ameri- 
can Statesman, he was the first man of his day. In 
stature he was six feet two inches in height, of perfectly 
developed form, and might have served as a model for 
the statue of Apollo. His eyes were blue or gray, his 
hair light, slightly tinged with red, his complexion ruddy, 
his countenance amiable, and his whole face beamed with 
cheerfulness, that badge of a gentleman, while his con- 
versation was fascinating, brilliant, and instructive. His 
step was elastic, his movements graceful, blending ease 
with dignity, and his whole manner cordial and affec- 
tionate. He commenced his classical studies at the age 
of nine years, and entered the college of William and 
Mary at seventeen, and devoted from twelve to fifteen 
hours a day to study. On his way to college he spent 
the Christmas holidays at the residence of Col. Nathan 
Dandridge, in Hanover, one of those old fashioned seats 
of Virginia hospitality, where on these merry occasions a 
circle of young and old often assembled to pass from a 
week to a fortnight — the seniors in amusements becom- 
ing their years, — the juniors in junketings, dancing, and 
plays of all sorts. Here Mr. Jefferson met for the first 
time a young man destined to act a conspicuous part in 
the future history of his country ; with whom his own future 
relations were to be mosc chequered in all but personal 
good will, at times a powerful coadjutor, — at times advo- 
cating widely opposite views, — possessing in some 
respects transcendant powers, and in all, unquestionable 
integrity; but partly from the lack of all solid training, 



THOMAS JEFFERSON. 131 

and a little perhaps from a natural want of stability, liable 
sometimes to mistake the impulses of his fervid nature for 
the promptmgs of settled views; yet with his inconsist- 
encies and errors, one of the most brilliant, at one time 
useful, and at all times popular men, of whom Virginia 
has boasted. He was a neighbor of Colonel Dandridge's, 
a broken merchant, who at the age of twenty-three or 
four, had dissipated his patrimony by miscalculations and 
incorrigible idleness. His quaint, sHghtly stooping figure, 
was coarse and ungainly. His bloodless face lacked every 
curve of beauty ; but the deep-set gray eye, gleamed like 
a diamond under the shaggy brow, and there was a play 
m its expression, and in the movements of the mouth, 
which bespoke a soul whose depths had not yet been 
stirred or sounded. His manners, dress, and even his 
pronunciation, were broadly provincial. He talked like 
a backwoodsman about men's natter al parts being 
improved by larnift, about the yearth, &c. But the voice 
which uttered these rustic sounds, without being musical, 
was deep and sonorous ; and when in his revels he 
raised it suddenly to its full leonine roar, the welkin rung 
again, and the whole air was filled with its tremendous 
vibrations. Men of profound knowledge were in the 
circle at Colonel Dandridge's, but he sought not their 
company. "His passion," said Mr. Jefferson, describmg 
this scene afterwards, "was fiddling, dancing and pleas- 
antry." In the last he excelled. None could tell a story 
with so sly a humor, none act a practical joke so cleverly. 
There was no end to his overflowing good humor and 
rollicking gaiety. He was, therefore, the prime favorite 



132 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

with the youngsters ; and oddly as it would seem, consid- 
ering their almost total dissimilarity of character, he and 
Jefferson struck up an intimacy and friendship, the latter 
of which we think lasted their whole lives ; at all events, 
it did on Jefferson's part. 

Not far from three months from this time, Patrick 
Henry — for the young broken merchant, and boon com- 
panion was he — called on his friend Jefferson, at Williams- 
burg, and informed him that he had " in the meantime " 
studied law, and was now at the Capital, to obtain his 
license. 

Mr. Je fferson became well versed in the Greek, Latin, 
French, Italian, and Spanish languages, making respect- 
able proficiency also in mathematics. After leaving col- 
lege he studied law five years with Judge Wythe, and was 
admitted to the bar m 1767. His success at the bar was 
remarkable, his fees the first year amounting to three 
thousand dollars. In 1769 he became a member of the 
Virginia House of Burgesses, in which, while a student 
of law, he had listened to Patrick Henry's great speech 
on the stamp act. That speech might have kindled in 
him the embryo desire to rival the forest-born Demos- 
thenes, or have led to the production of the Declaration 
of Independence, of which Edward Everett said: " It is 
equal to anything ever borne on parchment or expressed 
in the visible signs-of thought. " " The^heart of Jeflferson 
in writing it, " adds Bancroft, " and of congress in adopt- 
ing it, beat for all humanity. " 

In October, 1776, Mr. Jefferson resigned his seat in 
Congress and also his appointment of Commissioner to 



THOMAS JEFFERSON. 1 33 

France, to take part in the deliberations of the Virginia 
Assembly. A State constitution had been previously 
adopted, to which he had furnished the preamble, and 
he now applied himself to a radical revision of the laws 
of the co'r.monwealth, in which he was engaged for two 
years and a half. Among other valuable reforms, he pro- 
cured the repeal of the laws of entail, the abolition of 
primogeniture, and the restoration of the rights of con- 
science; reforms which he believed would eradicate 
" every fibre of ancient or future aristocracy." In 1779 
Mr. Jefferson succeeded Patrick Henry as Governor of 
Virginia, and held the ofifice during the most gloomy 
period of the Revolution. He declined a re-election in 
1 78 1, assigning as a reason, that, at that critical juncture, 
" the public would have more confidence in a military 
chief. " He returned to Congress in 1783, and reported 
to that body, from a committee of which he was chair- 
man, the definitive treaty of peace, (concluded at Paris, 
September 3rd, 1783, acknowledging the independence 
which had been announced in the Declaration of July 
4th, 1776.) In May, 1784, Congress appointed him 
Minister Plenipotentiary to act with Franklin and Adams 
in negotiating treaties of commerce and amity with 
foreign powers, and inji785 he succeeded Dr. Franklin 
as resident Minister at Paris. It was during this sojourn 
in France, which was one of the happiest periods of his 
life, that he formed that strong predilection for the French 
nation, over the English, which marked so conspicuously 
his subsequent career. He published while abroad his 
famous "notes on Virginia, " which attracted general 



134 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

attention throughout Europe. He left Paris in Septem- 
ber, 1789, and reached Virginia soon after the election 
of Washington as first President of the United States. 
Washington offered him a seat in his Cabinet, 
as Secretary of State, which he accepted. With 
Washington's administration began the fierce strug- 
gles between the two great political parties, the 
Republicans and Federalists. Mr. Jefferson was at 
the head of the former, and Alexander Hamilton 
at the head of the latter. When the war broke out 
between England and France, Mr. Jefferson was in favor 
of aiding France with our arms, while Hamilton was in 
favor of strict neutrality. This preference of France by 
Mr. Jefferson should not be a matter of surprise, when 
we consider his sanguine bilious temperament and his 
enthusiastic love of liberty; and especially when we 
remeiT ber that while Minister to France he was greatly 
admired and feted by the the savans, the literati, 
and especially by the illuminati of the gay and 
voluptuous city of Paris. Still less, should we be 
surprised, that he was charged with imbibing sentiments 
of French infidelity — that moral pestilence which swept 
like a cyclone over that devastated country, destroying all 
that was good, and profaning all that was sacred. The 
following letter, to his friend John Page, dated July 
15th, 1763, is a frank exposition of his religious views: 

"Perfect happiness, I believe, was never intended by 
the Deity, to be the lot of one of his creatures in this 
world : but that he has very much put it in our power, 
from the nearness of our approaches to it, is what I have 



THOMAS JEFFERSON. 135 

steadfastly believed. The most fortunate of us, in our 
journey through lite, frequently meet with calamities and 
misfortunes, which may greatly afflict us ; and to f jrtify 
our minds against the attacks of these calamities and mis- 
fortunes, should be one of the principal studies and 
endeavors of our lives. The only method of doing this, 
is to assume a perfect resignation to the Divine will ; to 
consider whatever does happen, must happen ; and that 
by our uneasiness, we cannot prevent the blow, before it 
does fall, but we may add to its force after it has fallen. 
These considerations, and others such as these, may 
enable us in some measure to surmount the difficulties 
thrown in our way ; to bear up with a tolerable degree of 
patience, under this burden of life ; and to proceed with 
a pious and unshaken resignation, till we arrive at our 
journey's end, when we may deliver up our trust mto the 
hands of Him who gave it, and receive such reward as to 
Him shall seem proportioned to our merit. Such, dear 
Page, will be the language of the man who considers 
his situation in life, and such should be the lan- 
guage of every man who would wish to render 
that situation as easy as the nature of it will admit. 
Few things will distract him at all ; nothing will disturb 
him much. If this letter was to fall into the hands of 
some of our gay acquaintance, your correspondent and 
his solemn notions would probably be the subject of a 
great deal of mirth and raillery ; but to you I can venture 
to send it. It is in effect a continuation of the many 
conversations we have had on subjects of this kind ; and 



136 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

I heartily wish we could continue these conversations 
lace to face." 

In a letter from Mr. Jefferson to his eldest daughter, 
occurred the following passage : "A promise made to a 
friend some years ago, but executed only lately, has 
placed my religious creed on paper. I have thought it 
just, that my family by possessing this, should be able to 
estimate the libels published against me on this, as on 
every other possible subject. I have written to Phila- 
delphia for Dr. Priestley's History of the Corruptions of 
Christianity, which I will send you, and recommend to an 
attentive perusal, because it establishes the ground-work 
of my view of this subject." The "reHgious creed on 
paper," here mentioned, was the Syllabus, etc , appended 
to the following letter to Dr. Rush : 

To Dr. Benjamin Rush. 

Washington, April 21st, 1803. 
Dear Sir : 

In some of the delightful conversations with you, in the 
evenings of 1798-99, and which served as an anodyne to 
the afflictions of the crisis through which our country was 
then laboring, the Christian religion was sometimes our 
topic ; and I then promised you, that one day or other, 
I would give you my views of it. They are the result of 
a life of inquiry and reflection, and very different f om 
that anti-Christian system imputed to me by those who 
know nothing of my opinions. To the corruptions of 
Christianity I am indeed opposed ; but not to the genu- 
ine precepts of Jesus Himself. I am a Christian in the 
only sense in which he wished any one to be ; sincerely 
attached to his doctrines, in preference to all others." 

Mr. Jefferson was a public professor of his belief in the 

Christian religion. In all his most important early State 



THOMAS JEFFERSON. 1 3 7 

papers, such as his Sumuiaiy View of the Rights of 
British America, his portion of the Declaration made by 
Congress on the causes of taking up arms, the Declara- 
tion of Independence, the draft of a constitution for 
Virginia, etc., there are more or less pointed recognitions 
of God and Providence. In his two inaugural addresses 
as president of the United States, and in many of his 
annual messages, he makes the same recognitions — 
clothes them on several occasions in the most explicit 
language, — substanti illy avows the God of his faith to be 
the God of revelation, — declares his behef in the efficacy 
of prayer, and the duty of ascriptions of praise of the 
Author of all mercies ; — and speaks of the Christian 
religion as professed in his country as a benign religion, 
evincing the favor of Heaven. Had his wishes been 
consulted, the symbol borne on our national seal would 
have contained our public profession of Christianity as a 
nation. There is nothing in his writings or in the his- 
tory of his life to show that his public declara- 
tions were insincere, or thrown out for mere 
effect. On the the contrary, his most confidential 
writings sustain his public professions, and advance 
beyond them into the avowal of a behef in a 
future state of rewards and punishments. The following 
passages are from his first Inaugural Address : Enlightened 
by a benign religion, professed, indeed and practiced in 
various forms, yet all of them including honesty, truth, 
temperance, gratitude and the love of man, acknowl- 
edging and adoring an over-ruling Providence, which by 
all Its dispensations proves that it delights in the happi- 



138 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

ness of man here and his greater happiness hereafter; with 
all these blessings, what more is necessary to make us a 
happy and prosperous people ? and may that Infinite 
Power which rules the destinies of the universe, lead our 
counsels to what is best, and give them a favorable issue 
for your peace and prosperity." From his first annual 
message, December 8 th, 1801 : "While we devoutly 
return thanks to the beneficent Being who has been 
pleased to breathe into them the spirit of conciliation and 
forgiveness, we are bound with pecuHar gratitude to be 
thankful to him that our own peace has been preserved 
through so perilous a season, and ourselves permitted 
quietly to cultivate the earth, and to practice and improve 
those arts which tend to increase our comforts." From 
his second Inaugural Mess'age, December 15th, 1802 : 
"When we assemble together, fellow citizens, to consider 
the state of our beloved country, our just attentions are 
first drawn to those pleasing circumstances which mark 
the goodness of that Being from whose favor they flow, 
and the large measure of thankfulness we owe for His 
bounty. Another year has come around and finds ub 
still blessed with peace and friendship abroad ; law, order 
and religion, at home. From his third annual message, 
October 17th, 1803 : "While we regret the miseries in 
which we see others involved, let us bow with gratitude 
to that kind Providence, which, inspiring with wisdom 
and moderation our late legislative counsels while placed 
under the urgency of the greatest wrongs, guarded us 
from hastily entering into the sanguinary contest, and 
left us only to look on and to pity its ravages." He con- 



THOMAS JEFFERSON. 139 

tributed freely to the erection of Christian churches, gave 
money to Bible Societies and other religious objects, and 
was a liberal and regular contributor to the support of 
the clergy. Letters of his are extant which show him 
urging, with respectful delicacy, the acceptance of ,€xtra 
and unsolicited contributions on the pastor of his parish, 
on occasions of extra expense to the latter, such as the 
building of a house, the meeting of an ecclesiastical con- 
vention at Charlottsville, etc. He attended church with as 
much regularity as most of the members of the congrega- 
tion — sometimes going alone on horseback, when his 
family remamed at home. He generally attended the 
Episcopal Church, and when he did so, always carried 
his prayer-book and joined in the responses and prayers 
of the congregation. He was baptized into the Episco- 
pal Church in his infancy ; he was married by one of its 
clergymen ; his wife Hved and died a member of it ; his 
children were baptized into it, and when married were 
married according to its rites ; its burial services were 
read over those of them who preceded him to the grave, 
over his wife, and finally over himself. No person ever 
heard him utter a word of profanity, and those who met 
him most familiarly through periods of acquaintance that 
they never heard a word of impiety, or any scoff at extend- 
ing from two or three to twenty or thirty years, declare 
religion from his lips. Among his numerous famiUar 
acquaintances, we have not found one whose testimony is 
different, or who entertained any doubts of the strict 
justice, sincerity, truthfulness and exemplariness of his 
personal character. 



140 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

He returned to America fully imbued with French 
philosophy, French poUtics, and French manners. The 
contagion spread with wonderful rapidity throughout our 
country, until the people were nearly evenly divided 
between those who sympathized with the English and 
those who sympathized with the French. Nothing but 
the firmness and the wisdom with which that greatest of 
all great men, George Washington, guided the ship of 
State enabled us to escape those whirlpools of anarchy 
and despotism which threatened to engulph European 
States. Mr. Jefferson himself, in after years, when Presi- 
dent of the United States, alluded in a semi-apologetic 
tone in his inaugural message to the excitement under 
which he had labored, by saying " during the throes 
and convulsions of the Old World, during the agonizmg 
spasms of infuriated man seeking through blood and 
slaughter his long lost liberty, it is not wonderful that the 
agitation of ihe billows should have reached this distant 
and peaceful shore. " After participating in the inaugura- 
tion of his friend and successor, James Madison, he 
retired to Monticello, where he passed the remainder of 
his life in attending to his private affairs, receiving his 
visitors and friends, and dispensing a generous hospitality. 

In 18 19 he took the chief part in founding the Uni- 
versity of Virginia, and acted as its rector until his death, 
which occurred on the same day with that of John 
Adams, July 4th, 1826. The following epitaph, written 
by himself, is inscribed on his tombstone: " Here was 
buried Thomas Jefferson, author of the Declaration of 
Independence, of the statute of Virginia for religious 



THOMAS JEFFERSON I4I 

freedom, and father of the University of Virginia. " Mr. 
Jefferson probably exerted a greater influence on the 
institutions of his country, than any other American 
except Washington. 

I should do injustice to the character of Mr. Jefferson, 
and disappoint pubHc expectation, were I to fail in my 
efforts to delineate in some sort, his domestic character ; 
and with that view I herewith copy a few letters to his 
daughters : 

To Martha J^ej^erson Randolph. 

(Extract) New York, April 4, 1790. 

I am anxious to hear from you, of your health, your 
occupations, where you are, etc. Do not neglect your 
music. It will be a companion, which will sweeten many 
hours of life to you, I assure you ; mine here is triste 
enough. Having had yourself and dear Poll to live 
with me so long, to exercise my affections and cheer me 
in the intervals of business, I feel heavily the separation 
from you. It is a circumstance of consolation to know 
that you are happier ; and to see a prospect of its con- 
tinuance, in <he prudence and even temper both of Mr. 
Randolph and yourself. Your new condition will call for 
abundance of little sacrifices, but they will be greatly 
over-paid by the measure of affection they secure to you. 
The happiness of your hfe depends now on the continu- 
ing to please a single person. To this, all other objects 
must be secondary ; even your love to me, were it possible 
that that should ever be an obstacle. But this it never 
can be. Neither of you can ever have a more faithful 
friend than myself, nor one on whom you can count for ■ 
more sacrifices. My own is become a secondary object 
to the happiness of you both ; cherish, then, for me, my 
dear child, the affection of your husband, and continue 
to love me as you have done, and to render my Hfe a 
blessing, by the prospect it may hold up to me, of seeing 



142 REMINISCENCES OF DlSTlNGtriSHED MEN. 

you happy. Kiss Maria for me, if she is with you, and 
present me cordially^ to Mr. Randolph ; assuring yourself, 
of the constant and unchangeable love of 

Yours affectionately. 
To Maria J^efferson {aged nearly 12 years). 

New York, April 11, 1790. 

Where are you, my dear Maria ? How do you do ? 
How are you occupied ? Write me a letter by the first 
post, and answer me all these questions. Tell me whether 
you see the sun rise every day ? How many pages a day 
you read Don Quixote? How far you are advanced in 
him ? Whether you repeat a grammar lesson every day ? 
What else you read ? How many hours a day you read ? 
Whether you have an opportunity of continuing your 
music ? Whether you know how to make a pudding yet, 
to cut out a beefsteak, to sow spinach, or to set a hen ? 
Be good, my dear, as I have always found you ; never be 
angry with anybody, nor speak harm of them ; try to let 
everybody's faults be forgotten, as you would wish yours 
to be ; take more pleasure in giving what is best to 
another, than in having it yourself, and then all the world 
will love you, and I more than the world. If your sister 
is with you, kiss her, and tell her how much I love her 
also, and present my affections to Mr. Randolph. Love 
your aunt and uncle, and be dutiful and obliging to them, 
for all their kindness to you. What would you do with- 
out them, and with such a vagrant for a father ? Say to 
both of them a thousand affectionate things for me ; and 
adieu, my dear Maria. Th. Jefferson. 

To Martha "Jefferson Randolph. 

(Extract.) New York, April 26, 1790. 
I write regularly once a week to Mr. Randolph, your- 
self or Polly, in hopes to induce a letter from one of you 
every week also. If each would answer by the first post 
my lettor to them, I would receive it within the three 
weeks, so as to keep up a regular correspondence with 



THOMAS JEFFERSON. I43 

each * * * * I long to hear how you 
spend your time. I think Mr. Randolph and yourself 
will suffer with ennui at Richmond. Interesting occu- 
pations are essential to happiness ; indeed the whole art of 
being happy consists in the art of finding employment. 
I know nothing so interesting, and which crowd upon us 
so much, as those of a domestic nature. I look forward 
therefore, to your commencing house-keepers on your 
own farm, with some anxiety ; till 'hen, you will not know 
how to fill up your time, and your weariness of the things 
around you will assume the form of a weariness of one 
another. I hope Mr. Randolph's idea of settling near 
Monticello will gain strength ; and that no other settle- 
ment will^ in the meantime, be fixed on. I wish some 
expedient may be devised for settling him at Edgehill. 

7o Maria y^ej^erson, Eppingtoti. 

New York, May 2d, 1790. 
My Dear Maria: 

" I wrote to you three weeks ago, and have not yet 
received an answer. I hope, however, that one is on 
the way, and that I shall receive it by the first post. I 
think it very long to have been absent from Virginia 
two months, and not to have received a line from your- 
self, your sister or Mr. Randolph, and I am very uneasy 
at it. As I write once a week t© one or the other of you 
in turn, if you would answer my letter the day, or the 
day after you received it, it would always come to my 
hand before I write the next to you. We had two days 
of snow, about the beginning of last week. Let me know 
if it snowed where you are. 1 send you some prints of a 
new kind of amusement. I send several, to enable you 
to be generous to your friends. I want much to hear 
how you employ yourself. Present my best affections to 
your uncle, aunt and cousins, if you are with them, or to 
Mr. Randolph and your sister, if with them ; be assured 
of my tender love to you, and continue yours to 
Your Affectionate^ 

Th. Jefferson. 



144 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGtTlSHED MEN. 

To Maria J^efferson, Eppington. 

New York, May 23, 1790. 
My Dear Maria : 

I was glad to receive your letter of April 25th, because 
I had been near two months without hearing anything 
from you. 

I hope you will now always write immediately on 
receiving a letter from me. 

Your last told me what you were not doing ; that you 
were not reading Don Quixote, not applying to your 
music. I hope your next will tell me what you are doing. 
Tell your uncle, that the President, after having been so 
ill, as at one time to be thought dying, is now quite 
recovered. I have been these three weeks confined by a 
periodical headache. It has been the most moderate I 
ever had ; but it has not left me. Present my best affec- 
tions to your uncle and aunt. Tell the latter, I shall 
never have thanks enough for her kindness to you, and 
that you will repay her in love and duty. Adieu my 
dear Maria. Yours affeetionately^ 

Th. Jefferson. 

To Maria y^effersoti, Eppington. 

New York, June 13, 1790. 
My Dear Maria . 

I have received your letter of May 23d, which was in 
answer to mine of May 2d ; but I wrote you, also, on the 
23d of May, so that you owe me an answer to that still, 
which 1 hope is on the road. In matter of correspond- 
ence as well as of money, you must never be in debt I 
am much pleased with the account you give me of your 
occupation, and the making the pudding is as good an 
article as any. When I come to Virginia, I shall insist on 
eating a pudding of your own making, as well as trying 
other specimens of your skill. You must make the most 
of your time while you are with so good an aunt, who 
can learn you everything. 

We had not peas or strawberries here, till the eighth 



THOMAS JEFFERSON. 145 

day of this month; on the same day, I heard the first 
whip-poor-will's whistle. Swallows and martins appeared 
here on the 21st of April. When did they appear with 
you? and when had you peas, strawberries, and whip- 
poor-wills in Virginia ? Take notice, hereafter, whether 
the whip-poor-wills always come with the strawberries 
and peas. Send me a copy of the maxims I gave you. 
I have had a long touch of my periodical headache, but 
a moderate one. It has not quite left me yet. Adieu 
my dear; love your uncle, aunt and cousins, and me 
more than all. Yours affectionately^ 

Th. Jefferson. 




146 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 



n Mm. 



JAMES MADISON. 

I^AMES MADISON, fourth President of the 
y^ United States, was born in King George 
County, Virginia, March i6th, 175 1, and died at his 
seat, MontpeHer, near Orange Courthouse, Va., 1836, 
His father was James Madison, of Orange, a planter of 
ample means and high standing, descended from John 
Madison, an Englishmen, who settled in Virginia about 
1653. The maiden name of his mother was Eleanor 
Conway. He was the eldest of seven children, and was 
sent at an early age to a school in King and Queen 
County, under the direction of Donald Robertson, a 
Scotchman. He afterwards prosecuted his studies at 
home under the Rev. Thomas Martin, the Minister of 



JAMES MADISON 147 

the Parish, who resided at Montpelier, and acquired a 
competent knowledge of Latin, Greek, French and 
Itahan. In 1769, at the age of eighteen, he was sent 
to Princeton, New Jersey, where he was graduated 
A. B , in 1 77 1. His habits of appHcation were so 
close at this period that his health became seriously 
affected. In 1772 he returned to Virginia, and com- 
menced a course of legal study, readmg also works on 
theology, philosophy, and belles-lettres. His attention 
was particularly directed to theology, and he thoroughly 
explored all the evidences of the Christain religion. 
From these pursuits his mind was diverted by public 
affairs. The colony was agitated by the impending 
struggle with England. The clergy of the Baptist and 
other non-conformist denominations had been subjected 
to violent persecutions, and the friends of religious rights 
were endeavoring to cure this abuse. Mr. Madison 
took an active part in his county m defence of the Bap- 
tists. In 1776 he was elected a member of the Virginia 
Convention from the County of Orange, and procured 
the passage of the substance of an amendment to the 
declaration of rights by George Mason, which struck 
out the old term toleration and inserted a broader expo- 
sition of religious rights. He was in the same year a 
member of the General Assembly. In the winter of 1779 
he was chosen by the assembly as a delegate to Congress. 
He took his seat in that body in 1780, and remained in 
it three yeais. He opposed the issue of paper money by 
the states. As Chairman of the Committee to prepare 
instructions to United States Ministers at Versailles 



14^ REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

and Madrid, and in support of the claims of the 
Confederacy to Western territory and to the free 
navigation of the Mississippi river, he drew up an elab- 
orate and able paper, which was unanimously adopted 
by Congress. As Chairman of the Committee to 
establish a system of general revenue to pay the expenses 
of the war, he prepared an able address to the 
States in support of the plan which was adopted by Con- 
gress, and received the warm approval of Washington. On 
his return, from serving in Congress, to Virginia, he was 
elected a member of the Legislature, and took his seat in 
1784. Here he inaugurated the measures relating to a 
revision of the old statutes, and gave his support to the 
bills introduced by the revisers, Jefferson, Wythe, and 
Pendleton, on the subject of entails, primogeniture, and 
religious freedom. He aided in the separation of Ken- 
tucky from Virginia, and the formation of the new State, 
opposed the further issue of paper money, and took a 
prominent part in favor of the payment of debts due to 
British creditors. His greatest service at this time was 
the preparation, after the adjournment of the Assembly, 
of a "memorial and remonstrance against the project of 
a general assessment for the support of religion." 

This paper is one of the ablest and most eloquent ever 
drawn up by the author, and caused the complete defeat 
of the measure against which it was directed. In Jan- 
uary, 1786, he obtained the passage of a resolution by the 
General Assembly of Virginia, inviting the other States to 
appoint Commissioners to meet at Annapolis, and devise 
a new system of commercial regulations of greater effi- 



JAMES MADISON. 149 

ciency than that under the articles of Confederation. Mr. 
Madison was chosen one of the Commissioners, and 
attended at Annapohs in September of the same year. 
Five States only were represented, and the Commissioners 
recommended a convention of delegates from all the States 
to be held in Philadelphia in May, 1787. The recom- 
mendation was generally adopted, and Mr. Madison was 
chosen one of the delegates from Virginia. The Con- 
vention assembled, and the result was the abrogation of 
the old articles and the formation of the Constitution of 
the United States. A warm discussion followed the sub- 
mission of the Constitution to the people of the United 
States for their adoption, and would probably have failed 
but for the publication of the " Federalist, " written by 
Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, and John Jay. 

The effect of these essays upon public opinion was 
very great. They changed, or materially modified the 
views of many thousands of ^'persons, among whom were 
some of the profoundest thinkers of the epoch. 

Jefferson wrote of the work, "In general it establishes 
firmly the plan of the government. I confess it has rec- 
tified me in several points." 

The volume remains the most forcible exposition upon 
the side which it espoused. The whole f,Tound is sur- 
veyed generally, and in detail ; the various points at issue 
are discussed with the utmost acuteness, and the advan- 
tages of the adoption of the instrument urged with a log- 
ical force and eloquence which placed the "Federalists" 
beside the most famous political writings of the old Eng- 
lish worthies. 



150 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

I'he Virginia Convention assembled in June, and Mr. 
Madison was a member of the body. He soon estab- 
lished his claim to a prominent position among the lead- 
ing men. He had succeeded in overcoming his natural 
diffidence, and although deficient as an orator, was eaabled 
by his profound acquaintance with every topic involved 
in the discussion, to exert a powerful influence over his 
associates. On both sides were ranged men of eminent 
abihties. The leaders of the Constitution party were 
Marshall, Pendleton, Wythe, Edmund, Randolph, and 
other statesmen of high reputation. Opposed to these 
were Monroe, Grayson, Henry and Mason. The two 
last named were a host in themselves — the one for his 
passionate and splendid eloquence, the other for a mas- 
sive vigor of reasonmg which made him almost irresistable 
in any discussion in which he earnestly engaged. 

The high position which Mr. Madison immediately 
assumed and fully maintained, in a body composed of 
such men, is the best commentary upon the character of 
his intellect. He was unquestionably a great power in 
the Convention, and zontributed to the final triumph of 
the Constitution as much as any one in the body. The 
instrument was adopted by a vote of 89 to 79, and the 
Convention rose. 

The part which he had taken in its deliberations 
very greatly increased Mr. Madison's reputation as a 
statesman, and he was brought forward as a candi- 
date for United States Senate. The attempt to elect 
him, however, tailed. This resulted from a peculiar 
state of parties. Although the Federalists had achieved a 



JAMES MADISON. I51 

victory in the Convention, and procured a fair majority in 
favor of the adoption of the Constitution, they were out- 
numbered by their opponents, in the commonwealth at 
large, and by the anti-Federal representation in the Leg- 
islature. Mr. Madison, therefore, suffered a defeat, and 
Lee and Grayson were elected in place of the candidates 
of the Federalists. He was, however, chosen a Repre- 
sentative in Congress, and took his seat in that body in 
April, 1789. Here he found himself compelled to adopt 
a thoroughly independent course of action, or violate the 
most deeply rooted convictions of his understanding. 

Alexander Hamilton was at the head of the Treasury 
Department, and Mr. Madison was obliged either to 
support the great series of financial measures initiated by 
the Secretary, or distinctly abandon his former associates, 
and range himself on the side of the Republican opposi- 
tion. He unhesitatingly adopted the latter course. 
Although he had warmly espoused the adoption of the 
Constitution, he was now strongly convinced of the 
necessity of a strict construction of the powers which it 
conferred upon the general Government. He accord- 
ingly opposed the Funding Bill, the National Bank, and 
Hamilton's system of finance generally. Many proofs 
remain of the fact that Mr. Madison assume i this atti- 
tude of opposition to the administration with great reluct- 
ance, and only under the pressure of his conscientious 
convictions of public duty. His affection for Washing- 
ton, and long friendship for Hamilton, rendered such a 
step peculiarly disagreeable to a man of his amiable and 
kmdly disposition. The tone of his opposition, however, 



152 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

did not alienate his former friends. It was moderate arxd 
dispassionate. Occupying middle ground between the 
violent partizans on both sides, he preserved himself from 
extreme views in either direction, and labored to reconcile 
and harmonize the antagonism of both parties. 

He thus secured the confidence and respect even of 
those with whom he differed. He always retained the 
cordial regard of Washington. On Mr. Jefferson's re- 
turn from France, Mr. Madison was solicited to take the 
mission, and it was kept open awaiting his decision for 
twelve months. He declined the place, as he afterwards 
did the office of Secretary of State on the retirement of 
Jefferson, from a conviction that the radical antagonism 
of views between himself and the majority in the Cabi- 
net would render his acceptance of either ofticf; fruitful 
in misunderstandings and collisions. Hamilton was the 
ruling power in the Cabinet, and Mr. Madison, with his 
customary discretion, declined an honor which promised 
a result so unsatisfactory to himself and the party to 
which he had signified his adhesion. He remained in 
Congress and became thoroughly indentified with the 
Republicans. In 1792 he was the avowed leader of the 
party in Congress. In 1794 he gave his full support to 
its foreign policy by moving a series of resolutions, based 
upon the report of Mr. Jefferson, advocating a retaliatory 
policy towards Great Britam, and commercial discrim- 
inations in favor of France. These resolutions he sup- 
ported by a speech of great ability. In 1795 it was the 
wish of many of his friends that he should become the 
candidate of the republican party, to succeed Gen. 



JAMES MADISON. 1 53 

Washington. Mr. Jefferson wrote, " there is not another 
person in the United States, who, being placed at the 
helm of our affairs, my mind would be so completely 
at rest for the future of our political bark. " Mr. Madi- 
son, however, discouraged the idea. " Reasons of every 
kmd " forbade it, he replied, and the subject was not 
resumed. In March, 1797, Mr. Madison's term expired, 
and he returned to Virginia. The period at which he 
vacated his seat in Congress was a critical one. Events 
soon occurred which threatene:! to plunge the country 
into war. The insulting treatment of the American 
envoys to France, and the war message of President 
Adams, were about to be followed by the alien and sedi- 
tion laws. The Republicans vainly tried to stem the 
popular current in favor of the measures of the adminis- 
tration. The agitation was so intense that the oppo- 
nents of the federal party were overwhelmed. Their 
protests were completely drowned in the popular out- 
burst against France, and on ihe floor of Congress they 
were in a helpless minority. The passage of the alien 
and sedition laws in July, 1798, gave them the first 
opportunity to made a stand. Opposition to these vio- 
lent measures was however ineffectual in the Federal 
legislature, and the Republican leaders determined to 
resort to tiie State arenas for the decisive struggle. It 
commenced in Kentucky, and resulted there in the 
adoption of a series of resolutions, which were followed 
in December, 1798, by similar resolves in the Virginia 
Assembly. The latter, now known as the resolutions of 
1798-99, were offered by John Taylor, of Caroline, but 



154 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

drawn up by James Madison, not then a member. The 
resolutions passed the house by a vote of loo to 6^, and 
were duly communicated to the several Stites of the 
Union, rhey met with little f^or, especially in the 
Northern States. Massachusetts and New England 
generally remonstrated against them, and declared the 
obnoxious laws both constitutional and expedient. This 
drew forth, in the winter of 1799- 1800, Mr. Madison's 
report in defence of his resolutions. 

This elaborate paper subjected the resolves to an 
exhaustive analysis, and defended them with masterly 
vigor. It is the most famous of all Mr. Madison's politi- 
cal writings, and will rank with the greatest State papers 
written in America. Although the resoluiions met with 
an unfavorable response from the other States, they 
exerted a powerful influence upon public opinion. Vir- 
ginia had shown how deeply in earnest she v/as, by 
directing the establishment of two arsenals, and an 
armory sufficiently large to store ten thousand muskets 
and other arms ; but a wholes )me change in the sentiment 
of the country happily restored good feeHng, and 
softened down all bitterness. The alien and sedition 
laws found few supporters ultimately, and Mr. Madison's 
views were fully vindicated. The revulsion against the 
Federal party, and in favor of the Republicans, termi- 
nated in the election of Mr. Jefferson, who entered upon 
the Presidency in i8ox. Mr. Madison was offered the 
place of Secretary of State, which he accepted, and con- 
tinued to fill during the eight years of Mr. Jefferson's 
administration. 



JAMES MADISON. 155 

During this period of service his opinions upon pubhc 
affairs, and his official action, closely agreed with the 
views of the President. He became still more popular 
with, and acceptable to his party, and toward the end of 
Mr. Jefferson's second term, was generally spoken of for 
the Presidency. 

A caucus was finally held of a majority of the Republi- 
can members of Congress, and Mr. Madison was nomi- 
nated. The action of the caucus was approved, and Mr. 
Madison was elected by a vote of 122 out of 175. He 
took his seat as President, March 4th, 1809, at a crisis 
in public affairs which required the utmost prudence. 
Great Britain and the United States were on the verge 
of war. The wrongs inflicted by England upon the 
commerce of America, and the rights of her seamen, had 
been consummated by the affair of the Leopard and 
Chesapeake. After various attempts to preserve peace 
had failed, war was declared, which commenced in 
earnest with the appearance, in February, 1S13, of a 
British fleet in the Chesapeake Bay. The United States 
Commissioners at Ghent signed a treaty of peace on 
December 24th, 18 14, and being communicated by the 
President to the Senate, was ratified by that body in 
February, 18 15. 

On March 3d, 181 7, Mr. Madison's connection with 
the affairs of the nation terminated, and he retired to his 
farm, Montpelier, in Virginia. In this pleasant retreat he 
passed his time tranquilly in agricultural pursuits and in the 
enjoyment of the society of his friends. Mr. Jefferson, in 
his estimate of Mr. Madison's character and abilities 



^ 



156 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

says : "He came into the House in 1776, a new member 
and young, which circumstances, concurring with his 
extreme modesty, prevented his venturing himself in 
debate before his removal to the Council of State in 
1777. From thence he went to Congress. Trained 
in these successive schools, he acquired a habit 
of self-possession, which placed at ready command the 
rich resources of his luminous and discriminating mind, 
and of his extensive information, and rendered him the 
first of every assembly afterwards of which he became a 
member. Never wandering from his subject into vain 
declamation, but pursuing it closely in language pure, 
classical, and copious, soothing always the feelings of his 
adversaries by civilities and softness of expression, he rose 
to the eminent station which he held in the great 
National Convention of 1787; and in that of Virginia 
which followed, he sustained the new Constitution in all 
i.s parts, bearing ofif the palm against the logic of George 
Mason, and the fervid declamation of Patrick Henry. 
With these consummate powers, were united a pure md 
spotless virtue, which no calumny had ever attempted to 
sully. Of the power and polish of his pen, and of the 
wisdom of his administration in the highest office of the 
nation, I need say nothing. They have spoken, and will 
forever speak for themselves." Again Mr. Jefferson says, 
" From three and thirty years trial, I can say conscien- 
tiously, that I do not know in the world a man of purer 
integrity, more dispassionate, disinterested, and devoted 
to pure Republicanism. Nor could I, in the whole scope 
of America and Europe, point out an abler head." 



JAMES MADISON. 157 

I saw Mr. Madison at his residence, Montpelier, in 
June 1824. It was the first time I ever saw him. He 
was in feeble health, and was lymg on his couch. He 
spoke but little, although Andrew Stevenson, a warm 
personal friend, afterwards Minister Plenipotentiary to 
Great Britain, was present. He had a quiet dignity, which 
inspired profound respect in all who approached him. 
His wife was unremitting in her attentions to him, and if 
he had been blessed with offspring, his life would have 
been crowned with those joys that a wait alone the good, 
the brave, and the great. 

Madison yielded the Presidency, March 4, 1817, to 
his Secretary of State and intimate friend, James Monroe, 
and retired to his ancestral estate at Montpelier, where 
he passed the evening of his days, surrounded by 
attached friends, and enjoying the merited respect of the 
whole nation. He took pleasure in promoting agricul- 
ture, as President of the county society, and in watching 
the development of the University of Virginia, of which 
he was long rector and visitor. In extreme old age, he 
sat in 1829, as a member of the Convention called to 
reform the Virginia Constitution, where his appearance 
was hailed with the most genuine interest and satisfac- 
tion, though he was too infirm to participate in the active 
labor of revision. He died at Montpelier, June 28, 1836. 
James Madison, while not possessing the highest order of 
talent, and deficient in oratorical powers, was pre-emi- 
nently a statesman of a well balanced mind. His attain- 
ments were solid, his knowledge copious, his judgment 
generally sound, his powers of analysis and logical state- 



158 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

ment rarely surpassed, his language and literary style 
correct and polished, his conversation witty, his tempera- 
ment sanguine and trustful, his integrity unquestioned, 
his manners simple, courteous, and winning. By these 
rare qualities be conciliated the esteem notonly of friends, 
but of political opponents, in a greater degree than any 
American statesman of the present century. He had a 
worthy helpmate in his wife, Dorothy Payne (born in 
Virginia 1767), whom he married at Philadelphia, in 
1794, she being then Mrs. Todd, a widow lady celebrated 
in society for beauty and accomplishments. During 
her long residence at Washington, Mrs. Madison was a 
conspicuous onament of the " Repubhcan Court," over 
which she ultimately presided ; she returned to Washing- 
ton after her husband's death, survived him until July 12, 
1849, and is. even now, admiringly remembered in Wash- 
ington, as " Dolly Madison." 



AMDRbW JACKSON. I59 




IX. 



ANDREW JACKSON. 

WAS invited by General Jackson, in October, 
1827, to visit him at his home, the Hermitage, 
fourteen miles above Nashville, on the Cumberland 
River. Two of my uncles in Kentucky were his warm 
personal and political friends. His friendship for me was 
the result of his gratitude to them. It was mani- 
fested by repeated acts of personal kindness and political 
preferment. His wife, aunt Rachael (as she was called), 
and her nephew, Andrew Jackson Donaldson, consti- 
tuted the family. They lived plainly and quietly, but 
very hospitably. There was no formaHty or ceremony, 
and their guests very soon felt themselves at home. 
The general was unreserved in his conversation, and 



I DO REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

spoke freely of public men ; of his enemies, with bitter- 
ness. In the course of the two weeks that I remained 
with him, he gave me the history of his military life. 1 
was forcibly reminded of a remark of a distinguished 
lady, who said she was present in a drawing-room in 
Washington, with a large party of ladies and gentlemen, 
when General Jackson was requested to give them a 
description of the battle of New Orleans. She said it 
was earnest, graphic, eloquent, and a person not know- 
ing . General Jackson, would never have supposed the 
narrator was the hero. He said to me the batde of the 
night of the 23d of December, if it could be called a 
battle, saved the city of New Orleans. About four 
o'clock in the afternoon of the 23d, while at dinner, he 
was informed that the British troops had landed 
eighteen miles below the city, and were marching up. 
He had very few disciplined troops under his command, 
was hourly expecting several thousand militia from Ken- 
tucky and Tennessee, and the salvation of the city 
depended upon their arrival. He had no breastworks 
and the g ound between the city and the British troops 
was a level prairie. After a few moments of anxious 
reflection he gave orders that every man in the city 
capable of bearing arms, should be ready in two hours to 
march with such guns as they could get, with or without 
ammunition. In two hours several thousand citizens 
were marching down the river, over a prairie bounded 
on the one side by the river, on the other by an impass- 
able swamp. About twelve o'clock they came within 
gunshot of the enemy, but being very dark, he could not 



ANDREW JACKSON. l6l 

be seen. The general gave orders to extend the Hne 
from the river to the swamp, and keep up a continuous 
firing until daybreak and then retreat. The British gen- 
eral supposing the American troops greatly out-numbered 
his own, retreated before daylight to his shipping, 
determining to return with his ships. Previous to his 
return the Kentucky and Tennessee troops had arrived, 
a breastwork of cotton bags had been constructed, ex- 
tending from the river to the swamp ; and when the 
enemy returned on the 8th of January, he was swept 
down like a field of grain, by the scythe of death. He 
said that while the British troops were lying at anchor, 
previous to the battle, Governor Clayborne was in the 
habit of granting passports to his friends to visit the 
British officers, against which he protested on the ground 
of their defenceless condition, and the corrupting influ- 
ence of British gold. The governor replied that he 
should exercise his discretion. Then said the general, 
' by the Eternal, if you issue another passport I'll hang 
you between the heavens and the earth. ' I said to him, 
would you have hung him in good earnest ? ' By the 
Eternal I would have hung him, ' and the flashing of his 
gray eyes proved his earnestness. 

His /account of his battles -with the Indians, some 
times in the night in the swamps and in rivers, as at the 
Coosa, was picturesque and almost romantic. 

I was frequently with him in his cotton fields, which 
were white for the harvest, and his servants busil)' gather- 
ing the crop. They were cheerful, and in no dread of 
the iron-man — iron when his enemies opposed him. His 

12 



l62 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

domestic government was patriarchal, and his subjects 
lovcfl him ; he said that everybody at home governed 
him, wife, servants and overseer. 

I was at the White Sulphur Virginia Springs, in the 
summer of 1834, where I met Geo. McDuffie, Judge 
Miller, and Colonel Pierce Butler, nuUifiers from South 
Carolina ; with whom I conversed freely, on the subject 
of nullification. I met there also Alfred Huger, from the 
same State, who was a member of the State Senate, and 
the only Union man in it. There was a perfect harmony 
in our views, on the subject of nullification and secession, 
and he wrote before I left, a very able letter on the sub- 
ject. I enclosed the letter to Wm. B. Lewis, General 
Jackson's confidential friend, and who lived with him in 
the Presidential mansion. He read the letter to the 
President, who called for pen, ink, and paper, and 
addressed a note to the Postmaster-general, directing him 
to send the commission of Postmaster to Alfred Huger, 
of Charleston, South Carolina. Being in Washington a 
few weeks after, I received through Lewis, an invitation 
from the President to breakfast with him the next morn- 
ing. Having gotten nearly through the breakfast, the 
General said to me : " Who did you see at the Springs?" 
I said, "I saw some of your nullifying friends from South 
Carolina." " What did they intend to do," said he, " if 
I had sent a vessel there to collect the duties ?" I replied 
" that they intended to declare Charleston a free port, 
and if he sent a vessel there to collect duties, they would 
call m the aid of the British fleet." He sprang from the 
table in a towering passion, saying : "By the Eternal ! If 



ANDREW JACKSON. 163 

Great Britain had dared to send any vessels there for any 
such a purpose, I would have sunk the fleet ! " 

One who knew General Jackson better than I did, said 
of him, he was a man of quick perception, of prompt 
action, of acute penetration, of unerring judgment of men ; 
distinguished for grace of manners and polished address-. 
He was steadfast in his friendships, and bitter in his en- 
mities. He could neither L)rook a rival nor opposition. He 
had the Imperial spirit of a conqueror not to be subdued, 
and the pride of leadership which could not follow. He 
was an American, intensely patriotic and national, loving 
his whole country, its honor, its glory, and especially its 
union. He lived a life of excitement, of storm and of 
warfare, and always at the head of his party. Upon the 
work in hand, he concentrated all his powers of mind 
and body; and thus inspired, there was no such word as 
fail. The man, who,rismg from a sick bed with a broken 
arm in a sling, could place himself before a company of 
insurgent soldiers, holding a pistol in the bridle hand, 
threaten to shoot down the first man that marched on, 
had nothing to learn of human audacity. Men of nerve 
quailed before him, as cowards quail before men of nerve. 
His air of command was not broken by any familiarity ; 
whoever looked upon him, saw one whom it was better 
to have as a friend, and dangerous to have as an 
enemy. 

He required of his friends an undeviating fidelity, and he 
freely gave what he exacted. He could excuse everything 
in a friend except disloyalty to friendship. That with him 
was an unpardonable sin. As a military man he was a 



164 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

rigid disciplinarian. He could sit beside a sick soldier all 
night, and share his last crust with him, and shoot him 
the day after for sleeping on his post. He did nothing 
by halves. A war with him was a war of extermination. 
It was a complete destruction of the powers of the enemy. 
He closed the war at New Orleans, by one of the most 
signal victories ever recorded in the annals of history. 
He died full of years and of honors, professing a sincere 
faith in the Christian religion, and leaving upon the 
country at his death a saddened sense of a great and 
common calamity. 

To the lessons inculcated upon the youthful mind of 
Andrew Jackson by his exemplary mother, are to be 
attributed much of the fixed opposition to the British 
oppression and tyranny, and the determined defence and 
support of the rights of his country, which distinguished 
him throughout the whole of his eventful career. 

His grandfather, who was born in the province of 
Ulster in Ireland, was descended from Scotch ancestors, 
and attached to their manners, language, and religion. 
He had four sons, the youngest of whom emigrated from 
Ireland in the year 1765, bringing with him his two 
sons, Hugh and Robert, He purchased a tract of land, 
with three of his old neighbors, in what was called the 
Waxhaw Settlement, in South Carolina. There, on the 
15th of March, 1767, Andrew Jackson was born. His 
father died about the same time, leaving his name to his 
young son, and the care of her three children to his wife, 
who faithfully and successfully executed the duties, 
which thus devolved upon her. Her youngest son she 



ANDREW JACKSON. 1 65 

intended for the church, and therefore aimed at giving 
him more than a common school education. Accord- 
ingly he attended a flourishing academy at the Waxhaw 
meeting-house. There he remained until the near 
approach of the Revolutionary war rendered it necessary 
for the young Jacksons to leave the country, or choose 
sides with the combatants. The sufferings of their grand- 
father at the siege of Carrickfergus, and the oppressions 
endured by the laboring poor, at the hands of the 
proud Irish nobility, had furnished themes to their 
mother for conversation over the winter's fire. She had 
accompanied her husband to America, that they might 
escape from the ruthless tyranny of their English oppres- 
sors, and she readily encouraged the ardour of their 
patriotic devotion, and indulged them in attending the 
drill and general musters of the neighborhood. 

In the year 1779, the British first invaded South 
Carolina, under General Prevost, who soon afterwards 
returned to Savannah, leaving the post at Stone Ferry in 
charge of a garrison, which Gen. Lincoln determined to 
cut off. He advanced against it on the 20th of June, 
with twelve hundred men, but the attempt was unsuc- 
cessful ; and in this affair, Hugh Jackson, Andrew's 
oldest brother, lost hij life. A desire to avenge the 
death of his brother, was thus added to the other 
causes of enmity, toward the brutal invaders of his 
country, and Andrew, at the age of thirteen, accom- 
panied his brother Robert to the American camp, and 
engaged actively in the cause of freedom. 

The course pursued by the invaders roused the spirit of 



l66 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

resistance, and caused many true patriots to gather round 
the standards erected by the noble partisans of Marion, 
Sumter, Pickens, and Davies. Ahnost all of the Waxhaw 
settlers were engaged in the partisan warfare, united 
under Colonel Davies. 

The attack on the British garrison at Hanging Rock, 
under Sumter and Davies, was the first battle field of 
Andrew Jackson. Though but thirteen years of age, he 
fought like a veteran, and the Waxhaw settlers, on that 
day suffered heavy loss. The unfortunate result of the 
fight, too, must have strongly impressed upon his mind 
the value of strict military regulations, and contributed to 
form the love of discipline, which afterwards character- 
ized his operations as a General, and which produced the 
declaration of martial law, when perfidy was suspected at 
New Orleans. 

When Cornwallis had crossed the Yadkin, the Wax- 
haw settlers returned to their homes, but the young Jack- 
sons, with many others, were constantly mounted and 
armed, and incurring every danger with their patriotic 
friends and neighbors. On one occasion a noted patriot 
Captain, named Sands, desired to spend a night with his 
family ; and eight soldiers, among whom were Robert and 
Andrew Jackson, constituted his guard. In the night, a 
band of tories was heard advancing to capture the house 
and its inhabitants. A British deserter was on the watch, 
and gave the alarm to Andrew Jackson, who immediately 
seized his gun, and advanced to meet one division of the 
band. Having hailed, and received no answer, he put 
his gun through the fork of an apple-tree and fired upon 



ANDREW JACKSON. 167 

the enemy. A volley was returned, which killed the sol- 
dier near his side. Jackson then went into the house, 
while another division of the enemy, advancing to attack 
on the opposite side, mistook the fire of their friends for a 
volley from the house, and began to return it. Thus they 
continued firing upon their friends and partly upon the 
house, until an officer, who was in the neighborhood, 
galloped toward the house alone, sounding a cavalry 
charge on his trumpet. The tories became frightened, 
and retired. Jackson had commenced firing, from the 
door, after re-entering the house, where two of his com- 
panions were shot down. He was then but fourteen years 
old. 

Rawdon, one of the British commanders, hearing of 
the return of the bold Waxhaw settlers, determined to 
capture and destroy them. Major Coffin was intrusted 
with the execution of his plan. He succeeded in sur- 
prising the settlers, although they were collected together 
at the Waxhaw meeting house ; eleven were taken pris- 
oners and the rest escaped, including the two Jacksons. 
They continued during the night in a thicket, but leaving 
it in the morning for the purpose of securing food, they 
were surprised by a party of dragoons and tories. While 
the troops were demolishing the furniture of the house 
and the clothing of its inmates, the commanding officer 
whose boots had been muddied in crossing a creek, com- 
manded the younger Jackson to clean them. He received 
an indignant refusal, and a demand for the treatment 
due a prisoner of war. The cowardly ruffian aimed a 
blow at his head with his sword, but the young hero 



1 68 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

parried it with his left hand, upon which he received a 
severe wound. Robert Jackson, for a like refusal, received 
a wound on his head, which was not dressed while he 
remained a prisoner ; and at the time of their release the 
two Jacksons were both infected with the small-pox. 
The oldest soon died, but Andrew was enabled by the 
natural vigor of his constitution to survive this complica- 
tion of ills. 

Before he had thoroughly recovered his health, his 
mother left him on an errand of mercy to the unfortunate 
captives who were confined in the prison-ships at Charles- 
ton. There she caught the fever, which raged amongst 
the prisoners, and soon after ended her days. Thus he 
was left the only survivor of the family. 

Deprived of the counsel of his mother, and thrown 
into the society of wild young men, young Jackson 
commenced wasting his patrimony and corrupting his 
habits. But foreseeing that he would eventually need to 
rely for support upon his own unaided exertions, he 
suddenly checked himself in his course of dissipation, 
and returned to his studies. The pulpit he now 
abandoned for the bar, and his legal acquirements were 
directed by two eminent counsellers. Judge iVtc Cay and 
Colonel Shakes, and he received a license to practice as 
attorney in two years. 

In 1788, he accompanied Judge Mc Nairy, to the 
Western District of North Carolina, comprising what is 
now the State of Tennessee. The Judge had recently 
been appointed, and he was going thither to hold his 
first court. When they reached that district, Jackson 



ANDREW JACKSON. 169 

found that the young adventurers of the place, had 
become indebted to the merchants, and had conspired 
to retain in their interest, the only lawyer in the country, 
so that the creditors were unable to prosecute their 
claims. They joyfully hailed the arrival of another law- 
yer, and Jackso.i, on the morning after his arrival, issued 
seventy writs. Such a prosperous opening was a strong 
inducement for him to remain in that part of the country, 
and the attempt made by the debtors to force him to 
leave it, produced a directly opposite effect. Fearing to 
encounter the bold lawyer in a personal attack, these 
persons caused him to be assailed by bulUes. The first 
attack of this kind was made by a flax-breaker, remark- 
able for his strength, and brute courage. Jackson reduced 
him to abject submission with his own blades. When 
conversing with a gentleman concerning business, a noted 
bully approached, and trod purposely on Jackson's foot. 
The young lawyer pushed him off, and brought him to 
the ground with the blow of a slab. The crowd inter- 
feied to stop the conflict, but the bully with horrid impre- 
cation, snatched a stake from the fence, and attempted 
to renew the attack. Jackson requested the crowd to 
stand aside, and moved with a firm step and steady eye 
toward the ruftian, who, struck with terror, dropped the 
stake and fled into the woods. His bold conduct in 
these attacks convinced his enemies of their inutiUty, 
and he was therefore suffered to proceed in the prosecu- 
tion of his professional duties without molestation, and 
with the approbation of all the better portion of the 
community. 



170 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

Receiving the appointment of attorney, for the Western 
District, he soon discovered that enormous frauds had 
been practiced in the North Carolina land office. Deem- 
ing it his duty to prosecute the perpetrators, the hostility 
of a large portion of the inhabitants, who were often 
interested in these fraudulent transactions, was by this 
means drawn down upon him. In addition to this his 
duties often required him to cross the wilderness between 
Jonesborough and Nashville, and to expose himself to the 
hostile movements of the Indians of that region, who 
waged perpetual warfare against the early settlers, and he 
soon became known to them as one of the boldest of the 
whites. Their respect for him was evinced by the names 
applied to hun as "Sharp Knife" and "Pointed Arrow." 
The experience gained at this period was of great service in 
his subsequent operations in the country of the Creeks. 
Gaining rapidly the conhdence of all classes, he was 
chosen a member of the Convention for the formation of 
a constitution for Tennessee, and when she was admitted 
into the Union, he was her first Representative in Con- 
gress. One year afterwards, in 1797, he was chosen one 
of her Senators. He connected himself with the Repub- 
lican party, but resigned in 1799, on account of the great 
preponderance of Federalists in tne Senate. 

He took an active part in the political canvass which 
transferred the executive power from the hands of Mr. 
Adams to those of Thomas Jefferson, and was again 
called into public life, at the age of thirty, by his appoint- 
ment to the bench of the Supreme Court of the State. 
Though he reluctantly accepted this office, he performed 



ANDREW JACKSON. J 71 

its duties with his usual firmness. On one occasion, being 
summoned as one of dipos^e comitatus to arrest a ferocious 
desperado, of whom the sheriff was afraid, he advanced 
upon him alone, with pistol in hand. As he did so, the 
man began to retreat, but stopped, threw down his arms 
and surrendered to the resolute judge. 

John Sevier, the Governor of the State, was among the 
number of his enemies, and carried his hostiUty so far, 
that his partisans at one time formed a plan to mob Jack- 
son, on his arrival at Jonesboro. Learning the reception 
which awaited him, he pressed forward though very ill, 
and reaching the hotel retired. Shortly afterward Colonel 
Harrison, with a regiment of men, arrived in front of the 
house, prepared to tar and feather nim. He was advised 
to lock his door, but he arose, threw it wide open, and 
sent a friend with his compliments to the Colonel, to say 
that his door was open, to receive him and his 
regiment, whenever they chose to wait upon him ; 
and that he hoped the chivalric Colonel was to 
lead his men, and not to follow them. The mes- 
sage was dehvered, the mob dispersed, the Colonel 
apologized for the inconsiderate violence of his con- 
duct, and became thenceforward one of the firmest 
friends of the General. His altercations with Governor 
Sevier, who was implicated in the land frauds, the perpe- 
trators of which he was resolved to punish if he continued 
on the bench, rendered his position there irksome in the 
extreme, and he resigned in 1804, six years after his 
appointment. He had accepted the oflUce of Major Gen- 
eral of Tennessee, when it was tendered to him by a vote 



172 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

of the field officers, but the discharge of its duties inter- 
fered little with the enjoyment of a peaceable retire- 
ment. 

The practice of his profession had acquired for him a 
fortune, suited to his limited wants, and he devoted him- 
self to the business of planting, on his farm on the banks 
of the Cumberland. His passion for fine horses led him 
CO turn his attention to raising them from good stock, and 
few, if any men, were more successful. The desire of 
exhibiting horses of his raising, and of recommending 
them to purchasers, naturally led him to bring them out 
on the race -courses. A difference about some money 
forfeited to him at a race, led, through the meddlesome- 
ness of others, to a duel with Charles Dickinson, who 
charged him with cowardice, and was challenged. 
Receiving Dickinson's fire, which inflicted a serious 
wound, he delivered his own, and his antagonist fell. His 
unfeehng conduct before the meeting had so exasperated 
Jackson's fearless spirit that he said to a fnend, who was 
astonished at his self-command, "Sir, I should have killed 
him, if he had shot me through the brain." 

Every effort to preserve honorable peace between 
Great Britain and America having failed. Congress 
declared war, June 12th, 18 12. Under the authority of 
an act, directing the President to accept the services of 
fifty thousand volunteers, Jackson issued an address to 
the citizens of his division, which brought twenty-five 
hundred of them around his standard. Their services 
were tendered to the government and accepted, and 
General Jackson received t'.ie thanks of the President and 



ANDREW JACKSON. I 73 

the Governor of the State, for his zeal in the pubUc ser- 
vice. . 

Marching with upwards of 2,000 resolute men to 
Natchez, in severe weather in December, to participate 
in the defence of the Mississippi, which was supposed to 
be threatened, an order came from the Secretary of War 
to disband them ; but Jackson, adhering to his promise 
to stand by his men, conducted them back to their 
homes, and offered to the Secretary of War to lead them 
north, to Maiden. The offer was not accepted. Some 
have supposed that General Wilkinson was at the bottom 
of the order from the Secretary of War, to disband his 
men, and that Wilkinson had fears of being superseded in 
command. 

The Creek Indians having joined the confederacy of 
tribes organized by Tecumseh, and attacked Fort Weems, 
in Mississippi, and massacred most of the garrison, the 
people of Tennessee proposed to avenge the outrage ; and 
General Jackson took command of the force called out, 
amounting to 4,000 militia. His first encounter with the 
foe, with troops under his command, was at Talladega. 
He found the enemy posted apparently in great force. 
The action was as warm as it was short. In fifteen min- 
utes the Indians were seen fleeing in every direction, but 
the fight was maintained with spirit and effect, as well 
after the flight as before. The pursuit terminated only 
when the enemy gained the mountains three miles distant. 
Nearly eleven hundred Indians were engaged in this 
action; two hundred and ninety-nine were left dead on 
the ground, and many were probably killed in the flight. 



I 74 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

A Striking example of patience and suffering was afforded 
to his iiiurmunng soldiers by the patriotic general dur- 
ing this campaign. A soldier saw the general sitting 
beneath a tree, busily engaged in eating something, 
while the rest of the army was coming up. Half starved 
himself, and believing that the officers, and Jack- 
son particularly, were well supplied, he came boldly up 
to him, stated his condition, and demanded a share of 
the general's feast. "I would willingly share with you 
what I have ", said the general, offering hmi some of 
the acorns which he had found beneath a tree, and 
which he said was the best and only fare he had. The 
astonished soidier retired to report to his companions 
the fact that the general fed himself with acorns, and to 
urge them, henceforth, to bear the sufferings which he 
nobly shared without complaint. 

At length, however, the officers and soldiers of the 
militia determined to leave the camp, and drew up early 
one morning to carry their threat into execution ; but 
they found the volunteers prepared to prevent their 
progress, and forced them to return to their old posi- 
tion in the camp. The firmness of their general was too 
much for them, they abandaned their purpose and 
returned to their quarters. 

The volunteers, however, were equally disaffected with 
the militia ; they had opposed the mutineers only to 
escape suspicion, and and really wished them success ; 
and they determined to march off themselves the next 
morning. Words fail to express their confusion and 
astonishment, when they found the very militia, whom 



ANDREW JACKSON. I 75 

they had yesterday forced into their quarters, prepared 
to execute a similar office for them to-day. They 
carried the play through, and returned in good order to 
their former position. 

General Jackson at length agreed to march home- 
ward, if the expected supplies were not received within 
two days. They came not, and the army marched. 
Twelve miles from the fort the army met a drove of one 
hundred and fifty beeves. After having satisfied their 
appetites, the general ordered the troops to return ; but 
they had commenced a homeward march, and were 
unwilling to encounter the perils of war. Almost the 
whole brigade had put itself in an attitude for moving 
off, and the campaign would certainiy have been broken 
off, but for the firmness of the general. Mounting his 
horse, he threw himself at the head of the column, 
armed with a musket. He was not able to use his left 
arm, but rested the musket on the neck of his horse, and 
threatened to shoot the first man, who should attempt to 
advance. The disaffected troops maintained a sullen 
silence, until two faithful companies, had formed in the 
rear of the general and in front of them, prepared to 
imitate his example in firing. Then they turned quietly 
round, and agreed to return to their posts. But no good 
results could;-;be brought about by disaffected troops, and 
the general at length allowed them to return home. He 
himself remained with a few faithful soldiers until Janu- 
ary, 1 8 14, when he was re-inforced, and defeated the 
Creeks, in two severe encounters, near Fort Armstrong. 

In this whole campaign, though having but a small 



176 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

force under his command, he exhibited the qualities of 
a great military leader, fertility of resources, unbounded 
influence over men, and the most cool and consummate 
valor and courage. But the term of service of his fresh 
troops, which was only sixty days, had almost expired, 
and he therefore honorably discharged them. The vol- 
unteers who had remained with him, when their fellows 
had returned home, were also marched into Tennessee, 
and there dismissed with testimonials of their honor, 
fidelity and patriotism. 

General Jackson was soon after joined by a fresh army 
of nearly three thousand men, with which he determined 
to advance into the enemy's country. In this campaign 
he was also eminently successful, and the small remnant 
of the Creeks soon after sought for peace. The victori- 
ous Tennesseeans were now dismissed ; but their com- 
mander had attracted the attention of the whole country 
by the firmness, intrepidity and daring, with which he 
faced the enemy, until the war was gloriously ended, and 
he was called into a wider sphere of action He received 
the appointment of Maj. General in the army of the 
United States, and was made a commissioner to nego- 
tiate a treaty of peace and alliance with the Creeks. 

While performing this duty he noticed the protection 
and encouragement, which the hostile Indians had hith- 
erto, and still received from the governor of the Spanish 
fortress of Pensacola. He dispatched Capt. Gordon as 
a commissioner to that governor, with the causes of com- 
plaint, requiring him to state the course he intended to 
pursue, whether he would preserve the peace between 



ANDREW JACKSON. I J' 7 

the two nations, or cloak the realities of war beneath the 
appearance of friendship. The governor admitted that 
he had supplied the Indians with arms, and Capt. Gor- 
don reported that he had seen under the eye of the gov- 
ernor from "one hundred and fifty to two hundred 
British officers and soldiers and a park of artillery, with 
five hundred Indians in the British military dress, armed 
with new muskets and under the drill of British officers. 
Added to this a British flag >vas seen flying from a Span- 
ish fort." Jackson determined to supply its place with 
the American eagle. Reinforced by two thousand Ten- 
nessee volunteers under Coffee, Gen. Jackson determined 
to take the responsibility, and end the governor's viola- 
tion of all principles of right and neutrality. He ad- 
vanced upon the town and sent a flag to the fort, but it 
was fired on beneath the Spanish flag. The capture of 
the city by force was speedily effected. The British re- 
treated, the hostile Creeks were driven out and pursued, 
and the Spanish forts were surrendered to him, to be held 
until Spain could maintain neutrality. 

Gen. Jackson now marched for New Orieans, where an 
attack was expected to be made by the British. He ar- 
rived in that city on the istof December, and established 
there his head-quarters. The story of the invasion of 
Louisiana has been too often told to need recounting 
here ; and having in my personal reminiscences of the old 
hero, given his own account of the battle of New Orleans, 
I need not recapitulate the events of that memorable and 
decisive conflict. 

To the glory of having freed the country from a most 
13 



lyS REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

formidable foe, Gen. Jackson was now to add that of quit- 
ing his official dignity to answer at the bar, as a 
private citizen, a charge of having infracted the laws of 
his country. During the continuance of martial law. 
Gen. Jackson had some difficulties with Judge Hall, 
which ended in an order to the judge to leave the en- 
campment. When peace was restored, the judge sum- 
moned Jackson to show cause why an attachment for 
contempt should not issue against him. Jackson re- 
strained the fury of the people, appeared at the bar of 
the court, suffered the judge to become the prosecutor 
and arbiter of his own grievances, and paid the fine of 
one thousand dollars said to be due to the offended majesty 
of the laws. Before he died, however, the general had 
the satisfaction to receive by a vote of Congress a rever- 
sal of the judgment of Hall, and the return of the fine 
with interest. 

For some time after the victory of New Orleans, 
bands of Seminoles, Creeks, and runaway negroes found 
an asylum, in the neutral Spanish territory of Pensacola, 
whence they made hostile incursions upon the frontier 
settlements. Towards the close of the year 1819, the 
general government ordered Jackson to go there with a 
sufficient force, to repress these incursions, and gave him 
authority to pursue the enemy across the Spanish Hne, 
if necessary. He routed the Indians in several engage- 
ments, and ascertained that these ravages had been made 
at the instigation of British emmissaries, two of whom 
Arbuthnot and Ambrister, were captured at the destruc- 
tion of an Indian village. They were tried by court 



ANDREW JACKSON. I79 

martial and condemned to death, and General Jackson 
immediately carried the sentence into execution. The 
campaign was speedily terminated, and General Jackson 
was about marching to Nashville, when he learned that 
the government of Pensacola had offered protection to 
the enemy. He marched against and occupied this 
post with twelve hundred United States soldiers ; but 
being attacked by some of the public journals, for what 
they considered a violation of international law, he re- 
paired to Washington to explain more fully his trans- 
actions. He was received in that city and in Balitmore 
Philadelphia and New York with the highest honors. 

From July to Oct., 182 1, he was engaged as Governor 
of Florida, in organizing a territorial government for 
those provinces, which had been ceeded to the United 
States. In 1824 he was a candidate for the presidency; 
but four competitors having been nominated, no one 
received the number of votes necessary to an election 
The choice of president devolved on the House of Rep- 
resentatives ; Mr. Adams was elected. In 1829, however^ 
General Jackson was elected to the presidency, and held 
that office during eight years, — one of the most stormy 
periods of our political history He retired to the 
Hermitage, on the inauguration of his successor, in 1837, 
and enojyed there the sweets of private life, until his 
death, June 8, 1845, in the seventy-ninth year of his age. 
Death found him in full possession of his faculties, and 
perfectly prepared for his long-expected advent. 



l8o REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 




€k^itt ^mn. 



JOHN RANDOLPH. 



^O John Randolph, of Roanoke, Hume's 
description ot Queen Ehzabeth is peculiarly 
appropriate. He says, "view her as a woman and she 
is too masculine'; view her as a man and she is too femi- 
nine ; throw both these considerations aside, and view 
her as a human being, she commands our highest admi- 
ration. " Our distinguished man was indeed a most 
extraordinary man, without prototype or antitype, a sort 
of /usus naiurm, certainly " sui generis. " 

The peculiarities of his genius were such as to leave the 
world in doubt whether the lurid light of madness did 
not lead to his eccentricities of character and conduct. 
He was born at Cawsons, in Va., the family seat of his 



JOHN RANDOLPH. l8l 

maternal ancestors, on the third of June, 1773. His 
family was one of the oldest and most distinguished of 
the old Virginia gentry. On the father's side he was 
descended from Pochahontas, an Indian Princess, the 
daughter of King Powhatan, who was distinguished for 
those heroic qualities which characterized the Indian 
previous to hisdemoraHzstion by the white man. Pocha- 
hontas was beautiful in person, affectionate in disposition, 
gentle in manners. Her personal beauty has been the 
admiration of the Old World as well as the New. Her 
devoted affection was manifested by prostrating herself 
between Captain John Smith, the object of her affections, 
and the uplifted club of the unfeehng savage, and by this 
heroic act preserving the life of this daring adventurer. 
That act alone will shed an eternal halo around her 
memory. She was remarkable for her gentleness, that 
loveliest of all female qualities. It was the distinguish- 
ing trait in the characters of the gentle Beatrice, the 
gentle Desdemona, and the gentle Eve. 

Witiiin less than three years after Mr. Randolph's 
birth, his father died. His mother was in every respect 
fitted for the task of impressing and moulding a mind 
and spirit so much requiring maternal influence. She 
was devotedly attached to her orphan boy, whose beauty, 
delicacy of frame, and intelligence, were calculated to 
excite even more than common tenderness in a mother's 
bosom. He was never a laborious student, and could 
not endure protracted mental labor, nor did he require 
it ; his genius was almost intuitive , and nature is the best 
teacher. In his fifteenth year he lost his mother, whose 



l82 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

death he deplored with the deepest grief. When about 
taking his place in the world, his brother Richard died. 
His loss was irreparable ; he looked up to his brother no 
less in pride and reverence than in love. Thus one by 
one those alone who understood him were taken from 
him. 

This bereavement fell upon him with crushing severity, 
and the morning of his life seemed a dead blank. His 
physical organization was as delicate as a woman's. His 
frame had a nervous sensitiveness in harmony with the 
tone of his mind. He said he felt as if he had been born 
without a skin ; an east wind would send him to bed, and 
a cloudy day give him the blue devils. His figure was 
tall and erect, his arms and legs long, his body short and 
small ; his face was copper-colored like that of his 
progenitors, and without beard. He had a composed 
presence, well defined features, elongated chin, and a 
dark flashing eye like that of a basilisk, under the stroke 
of which men quailed with fear. In his earliest political 
teachings, he was much under the influence of George 
Mason and Patrick Henry, than whom there were no 
greater men nor purer patriots. George Mason was the 
author of the bill of rights, a document of national 
importance, inferior only to the Declaration of Independ- 
ence. He was the grandfather of James v[. Mason, 
who, while a Senator, in Congress from Virginia, con- 
spired with Jeff. Davis and others, to pull down that 
Temple of Liberty, which his grandfather labored so long 
and arduously to build up, and which he perilled his life 
to defend. 



JOHN RANDOLPH. 1 83 

Mr. Randolph, in early life, was much under the influ- 
ence of Mr. Jefferson, who was his cousin ; and from him 
imbibed his prepossessions in favor of the French and of 
the French revolution. Very seasonably Burke's letter on 
the French revolution fell into his hands, and his conver- 
sion was as thorough as it was sudden. 

When it was proposed to declare war against England, 
Mr. Randolph, then in Congress, said : "I do not desire 
war with England — I do not justify her conduct toward 
us ; but I remember that we are of the blood and bone of 
her children ; that we speak her language ; that we are 
connected with her by the strongest commercial ties and 
interests ; that though we fought her through a long and 
bloody war, we fought her by the light of her own prin- 
ciples ; that her own great men cheered us on in the 
fight ; that we inherited from her the principles of liberty 
which he at the basis of our government , freedom of 
speech and of the press , the habeas corpus ; trial by jury ; 
representation with taxation ; and the great body of om 
laws. He reverenced her for what she had done in the 
cause of human progress ; for her achievemen ts in arts 
and arms ; for her lettered glory ; for the Hght shed on 
the human mind by her master writers ; and the blessings 
showered upon the world by her great philanthropists. 
He now saw her in a new phase of character. Whatever 
was left of freedom had taken shelter in that island, as 
man, during the deluge, in the ark. She presented the 
only barrier now left to the sway of unlimited empire, by a 
despot, whom he detested, as one of the most merciless 
and remorseless tyrants that ever scourged the earth. 



104 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

This man of destiny had carried everything before him. 
His great genius seemed even less than his great fortune. 
His career was a history of prodigies. He took king- 
doms as other warriors took forts. He ran up his flag 
over capitols as other Generals fly theirs over fortresses. 
His imperial banner hovered like the wing of the destroy- 
ing angel over the great battle fields to which he led his 
conquering legions. The modern Alexander was seeking 
to complete the subjugation of the world. But one 
obstacle stood in his way. Twenty miles of sea rolled 
between his camp and England. He could see but could 
not reach the last fortress of freedom in the old 
world." 

" Deserted by all other men and nations, England was 
not dismayed. She did not seek to avoid the issue ; she 
defied it, she dared it ; she stood against the arch con- 
queror's power, as her own sea-girt-isle stands in the 
ocean, calm amidst the storm and the waves that blow 
and break harmlessly on the shore. As she stands in her 
armour, glittering like a war god beneath the lion ban- 
ner under which we once fought with her at the Great 
Meadows, at Fort Du Quesne, and on the Heights of 
Abraham. " 1 cannot, for my soul, I cannot find it in 
my heart to strike her now, " 

On another occasion when the English people had given 
him some imaginary offense, he spoke of them with great 
bitterness, and said: " Not with more pleasure did they 
hear Bonaparte was on board the Bellerophon on his 
way to Elba, not with more pleasure did they hear of 
the capture of Washington, than they would hear that 



JOHN RANDOLPH. 185 

the city of Richmond was wrapped in flames, and its 
fires quenched with the blood of its citizens. " 

That Mr. Randolph was a man of brilliant genius, all will 
ad.nit ; that he was unfeelingly sarcastic, none will deny. 
His conduct when least offensive was governed by 
caprice. He was rarely, if ever, moved to action by love 
for his race. Like Hobbes he seemed to think war was 
the natural state of man, and he struck the affections out 
of his map of human nature, leaving no trace of the 
moral sentiments. Physical causes doubtless led to his 
idiosyncracies, and he was scarcely morally culpable. 
His partialities, I cannot say hu affections, played in a 
very circumscribed circle. Virginia was his country, and 
a gentleman free-holder the only legitimate sovereign. 
Even he worshipped kingly power, and boasted of his 
descent from a savage. I saw him in 1818 in his log 
cabin in the forest of Roanoke ; his constitution was a 
wreck, his health was gone, his ambitious hopes had died 
within him, his gloom approached cimmerian darkness, 
and his hypochondriasis verged upon insanity. At such 
times he knew nothing, heard nothing, saw nothing 
beyond civility to his guests. I have seen him at other 
times, when the sky was clear, the air bracing, his health 
tolerably good, and the society of his friends agree- 
able to him, and especially when he was warmed up by 
that Madeira which he imported. Then his mind glow- 
ing with electric heat, roamed through the world of 
science, art, literature and taste, speaking with the learn- 
ing of Plato, and the eloquence of Tully. His corusca- 



1 86 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

tions on these occasions were volcanic, and when ex- 
hausted left him in helpless despair. 

A few more conflicts with men, a few more struggles 
with his disease which had accompanied him through life, 
for he said he had been sick all his life ; brought him to 
the verge of the grave. 

I saw him in Washington city in 1833, on his way to 
Europe. He was supported by his friends into the 
Senate Chamber, expressing a wish to hear Mr. Clay's 
voice once more. Mr. Clay saw his old rival and foe, 
approached him, extending his hand. The interview was 
touching ; the past was forgotten, and the illustrious com- 
moners parted to meet no more on earth. 

Mr. Randolph died a few weeks after in Philadelphia. 
His faithful servant John carried him back to his solitary 
h®me and buried him in the forest of Roanoke, between 
two tall majestic pines standing a few steps from the door 
of his dwelling. The gloo.u of their shade and the mel- 
ancholy sighing of the winds through their boughs, are fit 
emblems of the life which was breathed out in sadness 
and in sorrow. 

For the following description of Mr. Randolph's style 
of speaking, we are indebted to Mr. William H. Elliott : 

"It has been said by some, who have heard Mr. Ran- 
dolph, both in Congress and on the hustings, that on the ;. ^ 
latter theatre he made his most fascinating and brilliant 
displays. I have not heard him in Congress, but I cannot 
conceive that anything he uttered there, could possibly 
surpass what I have heard on the hustings. 

Most generally, when it was expected he would speak, 



JOHN RANDOLPH. 187 

a large proportion of the crowd would anticipate his arri- 
val by some hour or two, and gather around the stand to 
secure a close proximity to the speaker. But when he 
was seen to move forward to the rostrum, then the court 
house, every store and tavern, and peddler's stall, and 
auctioneer's stand, and private residence was deserted, 
and the speaker saw beneath him a motionless mass of 
humanity, and a sea ot upturned faces. When he rose, 
with a deliberate motion he took off his hat, and made a 
slight inclination of the body, a motion in which grace 
and humility seemed inexplicably blended. Now the 
grace was natural, but the humility was affected, but with 
such consummate address as to pass for genuine, except 
among those who know that ars est ielare artem. His 
exordium .^as brief, but always peculiarly appropriate. 
His questions were few and simple, yet exactly no more 
or fewer than what the occasion called for ; with many 
speakers there seems to be an unpruned luxuriance of 
gesticulation, laboring most painfully to bring forth a 
mouse of an idea ; but in the case of Mr. Randolph, the 
idea was sure to be bigger than the gesture that accom- 
panied it. His voice was unique, but yet so perfect was 
his pronunciation, and so sharp the outlines of every 
sound, that, as far as his voice could be heard, his words 
could be distinguished. In short, his speaking was 
exquisite vocal music. An accurate ear could distinguish 
as he went along, commas, semi-colons, colons, full-stops, 
exclamation and interrogation points, all in their proper 
places. In adverting to what he conceived to be the 
overruling agency of Providence in the affairs of men, no 



l88 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

minister of the Gospel could raise his eyes to Heaven 
with a look more impressively reverential. If the reader 
will look at Hamlet's advice to the players, and conceive 
it to be punctually followed to the letter, Shakspeare will 
give him a better idea of Randolph's oratory than he can 
derive from any other source.* He seemed to have dis- 
carded from his vocabulary most of those sonorous sesqui- 
pedalia verba which enter so largely into the staple of 
modern oratory, and to have trimmed down his language 
to the nudest possible simplicity, consistent with strength. 
When he had gotten fully warmed with the subject, all 
idea of any thing nearer to perfection in eloquence, was 
held in utter abeyance, and when he concluded, all felt 
that they had never heard the like before ; for the 
speeches of this remarkable man were characterized by 
,^all that is conclusive in argument, original in conception, 
felicitous in illustration, forcible in language, and faultless 
in delivery." 

Doctor C. H. Jordan, formerly a citizen of Hahfax 
county, Virginia, but a resident of the State of North 
Carolina at the time of his death, published in 1827, an 
account of Mr. Randolph's great speech at Halifax court 
house, in the spring of that year, from which account 
the following extracts are taken : 

" Mr. Randolph's was a peculiar physical organization, 
incasing one of the most astute philosophic minds of his 
or any other day. No statesman ever looked into or 
predicted the future of any governmental policy with 
more accuracy than did Mr. Randolph. 



♦ Hamlet, Act III, Scene II. 



JOHN RANDOLPH. 189 

But to give those who never saw him some idea of 
his personal appearance and presence, I may say, that 
he was tall, slender, delicate and feeble, with a short 
body, long legs and arms and the longest fingers I ever 
saw. His head was not very large, but was symmetrical 
in the highest degree. His eyes were brilliant beyond 
description, indicating to a thoughtful observer a brain 
of the highest order. No one could look into them with- 
but having this truth so indelibly impressed upon his own 
mind, that time's busy fingers may strive in vain to efface 
the impression. His eye, his forefinger and his foot were 
the members used in gesticulation ; and in impressing a 
solemn truth, a warning, or a proposition to which he 
wished to call the attention of his audience particularly, 
he could use his foot with singular and thrilling effect. 
The ring of the slight patting of his foot, was in perfect 
accord with the clear, musical intonations of that voice 
which belonged only to Mr. Randolph. In his appeals 
to High Heaven, the God of the universe, the Final 
Judge of all the earth, with his eyes turned heavenward, 
and that " long, bony finger " pointing to the skies, both 
gradually lowering as the appeal or invocation closed, 
the moral effect was so thrilling that every man left the 
scene with (for the time at least) a better heart than he 
carried there. 

The " long, bony finger " really appeared, when used 
in gesticulation, to have no bone in it ; for when it had 
accomplished what it had been called into action for, it 
would fall over the back of his hand, almost as limp as a 
string, as if, having done its work, it sought repose. 



190 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

But I have digressed from what I set out to write, viz : 
Mr. Randolph's great speech at Halifax in 1827. I 
would that the task had fallen to hands more skillful than 
mine ; that the power of that mighty effort had been por- 
trayed by an abler pen before the force of circumstances 
devolved the duty upon me. Of the vast multitude there 
assembled, only a few yet remain to witness the fulfill- 
ment of the ominous predictions of the illustrious speaker. 
These should aid in preserving from oblivion the almost 
prophetic warnings they then received. 

He came to breast the flood then rolling on from the 
western portion of the state for a convention. In spite 
of all his efforts, however, the stream increased until it 
found temporary rest in the convention of 1829. It had 
been known for a long time, and for many miles around, 
that he would be there upon that occasion and would ad- 
dress the people on that question. The time drew nigh ; 
the people every where were talking about it ; expectation 
ran high. The day arrived and the crowd was immense, 
the largest I ever saw at a country gathering; variously 
estimated at from six to ten thousand, representing all the 
bordering counties in Virginia and North CaroHna. 

As the hour approached, every countenance beamed 
with anticipation, or was grave with anxiety, for the 
weather was a little inauspicious, and Mr. Randolph's 
health was bad. It was known that he had reached 
Judge Leigh's, but fears were entertained that he might 
be deterred by the weather. About ten o'clock, how- 
ever, the thin clouds vanished, and about eleven, news 
passed like an electric current through the vast multitude 



JOHN RANDOLPH. I9I 

that he was coming. In an instant the crowd began 
moving slowly and noislessly towards the upper tavern. 
Scarcely had they reached the summit of the slope be- 
tween the courthouse and the tavern, when they saw him 
coming on horseback, his carriage in the rear, driven by 
one of his servants. As he drew near, the crowd simul- 
taneously divided to each side of the street, making a 
broad avenue along which he passed, hat in hand, bow- 
ing gracefully to the right and to the left, until he reached 
the lower tavern. The people, with uncovered heads, 
silently returned the graceful salutation. As he passed 
on to the lower tavern, the multitude followed in pro- 
found silence, not a shout not a word being heard. 
Alighting and going in for a few moments, he soon re- 
appeared, crossed the street, ascended the steps leading 
over to the courthouse, and began by asking: " Fellow- 
citizens: — why in my feeble condition am I here ? Love 
of your liberty, as well as my own, compelled me to 
come." A mighty effort he said was being made by 
politicians to call a convention to alter the constitution 
of the State. He warned them against the danger of 
tinkering with the constitution ; said that " few, if any< 
had ever been bettered by so doing ; " reminded them 
that change was not always improvement, that the 
change then sought began in the west for sectional 
power, that it was the work of " mushroom politicians, " 
seekmg place and power in the only way in which they 
could obtain them. 

He next adverted to the social, civil and religious lib- 
erty the people of Virginia enjoyed, and asked what 



I 92 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

more they wanted ? " Ah ! but, " said he, " politicians 
want more. They want the right of suffrage extended ! 
And for what? only that upon it they may ride into 
ofhce ! " And here he denied the right ; upon sound 
governmental principles, of any man to vote to tax, or 
to impose any other State burden upon the people of 
Virginia to-day, and to-morrow set out for Pennsylvania 
or New York, there to remain beyond the reach of 
accountability for injuries inflicted on Virginia. He 
admitted the difficulty of prescribing exact limits to the 
right of suffrage, but believed that Virginia had come 
nearer to it than other States, viz: in allowing it to none 
but those who had a " permanent interest in the soil. " 
This restriction, he said had been adopted as a part of 
her constitution, after mature deliberation by some of 
the wisest and purest statesmen and sages the world has 
ever produced. 

Here he dwelt at considerable length on state and 
national authorities, defining the boundaries of each, and 
cautioning the people against the conflict with the pow- 
ers delegated to the General Government, maintaining 
that delegated power was all that it could claim, and all 
not thus obtained belonged to the states severally, or to 
the people. He admonished them to tiiake no encroach- 
ment on the rights of the Federal Government, and to 
suffer none to be made upon their own ; said that a reck- 
less disregard of these powers, or a false interpretation of 
them by unqualified men in power, had on several occa- 
sions come very nigh destroying our beautiful political 
fabric then being watched with jealousy by every mon- 



JOHN RANDOLPH. 193 

archist on earth. He adverted to Shay's and Shattock's 
war in Massachusetts, the whiskey insurrection in Penn- 
sylvania, etc., as instances of the precipitate action of 
hasty, incompetent men ; and in the same connection 
severely animadverted on the Missouri Compromise as a 
political measure of like character, hasty, ill advised, weak 
and fraught only with humiliation and future danger. 

Here he drew a striking and vivid picture of the " old 
ship of state " sailing amongst these breakers, and with 
extended arms, and eyes raised to heaven, he threw his 
body forward (as if to catch her) crying as he did so, in 
a half imploring, half confident tone, " God save the 
old ship! " It was the most solemn, the most impressive 
gesture I ever saw from any human being; and so power- 
ful was the impression made, that the whole multitude, 
many with extended arms, seemed to move involuntarily 
forward, as if to help save the sinking ship. 

After portraying many of the evils of an extended 
ballot, he raised his eyes to heaven, and in an humble 
Christian-hke manner, thanked God that in all our diffi- 
culties we yet had a pure judiciary. " Fellow citizens, " 
said he, " keep your judiciary pure, and your liberties are 
safe. Let it be contaminated by political strife, and all 
will be gone ! The name of liberty alone will remain to 
you as a phantom, a wili-o '-the-wisp to lure you on to 
degradation, and the destruction of all that is dear to 
you now. From the bench to the jury box these feelings 
would gradually find their way, until courts of justice 
would become; mere instruments for rewarding friends, 
and punishing opponents. Let the candid observer of 

14 



194 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

passing events say how far these predictions have reached 
their fulfillment. 

Mr. Randolph reminded his hearers, that during a 
long life in Congress he had often been taunted with — 
" You never propose anything ! " " You are always trying 
to tear down other men's work ! " Pausing a moment 
with that long finger pointing back from the top of his 
forehead, he said : 

"True, and I regard it as the brightest feather in my cap. 
My whole aim has been to prevent, not to promote, legis- 
lation. Litigation would then be rarer, and our troubles 
would almost cease ! " He said that it was with pain and 
misgivings that he beheld the tendency throughout the 
country to excessive legislation, and called attention to 
the prediction he would then hazard, that if the country 
should ever be destroyed, it would be by " excessive legis- 
lation." 

He next gave an outline of his course in Congress, his 
opposition to the tariff and to the United States Bank ; 
said there was no warrant in the Constitution for any 
such institution as the latter; that ours was intended for 
a " hard money " government ; that he had it from many 
of the fathers of the constitution; that he had lived in their 
day and was familiar with then sentiments on that sub- 
ject. He said that he would be the veriest dunce on 
earth if he were unacquainted with the fundamental prin- 
ciples of government, for he had grown up and become 
familiar with many of the leading men of Virginia, who 
had assisted in the conception and election of the mighty 
political fabric under which we lived, and enjoyed all the 



John Randolph. 195 

blessings of a free and happy people. Said he, " mind, 
gentlemen, how you touch it ; how you set about with 
innovation. Once gone, you may never restore it. Revo- 
lutions never go back, but on and on they roll; no 
returning tide brings repose ; no bow of promise spans 
their dark horizon. On and on they go, until all is 
swallowed up in the abyss of anarchy and ruin ! " 

During the long and entertaining speech, every man of 
both races, seemed bound to the earth on which he stood ; 
not one moved." 

The Convention, however, was called ; Mr. Randolph 
was elected to it, served with characteristic fidelity, and 
returned to Halifax in 1829, to give an account of his 
stewardship. By his arduous labors in that body, his 
health had suffered greatly ; he was too feeble to speak 
out of doors, and the county court, then in session, ten- 
dered him the court house, which he gratefully accepted. 
As he moved up to the bench, it was apparent to every 
one, that he lacked physical ability to entertain the people 
as he had done on the previous occasion. Taking his 
stand on the county court bench, and supporting himself 
with one hand on the railing, and the other on his cane, 
he began by returning his thanks in a polite and graceful 
manner, to the worshipful court for their kindness in sur- 
rendering their business to accommodate one who needed 
so much their consideration. He told them it must be 
plain to all, that it was the last speech he should ever 
make in Halifax. He gave a succinct scatement of all the 
various alterations (he would not call them amendments) 



196 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

promised to the Constitution, and advised the people to 
vote against them. 

He then showed what he called a trick of the Conven- 
tion, in submitting the ratification or rejection of the pro- 
posed alterations to the vote of the people. " Who called 
the Convention ? " he asked. " The freeholders ! Who 
had the right to say whether the work was done accord- 
ing to their wishes, but those who ordered it ? No one ! 
The non freeholders, according to all the rules of legiti- 
mate induction, had no more right to vote on that ques- 
tion, than the people of Hayti! " 

Mr. Randolph was in many respects a great man. As 
a statesman he had great sagacity and discernment. As 
a philosopher and student of history he stood in the fore- 
most ranks, while as an orator, he would compare with 
any that the nineteenth century has produced. 

His voice was uncommonly shrill, but was of that 
soft, flute-like character that always elicited admiration ; 
and feeble as he was for nearly his whole life, he could 
always modulate it as to make every member of the 
largest assemblies distinctly hear every word that he 
uttered, and that without the least strain on his vocal or 
respiratory organs. 

Mr. Randolph was, however, deficient in some qualities 
which constitute a statesman. One cardinal defect and 
error with him, was, the belief that man is governed 
more by fear than love. A maxim which all bad men 
adopt, and which all good men repudiate. He was also 
deficient in self-knowledge; consequently in knowledge 
of others. He had no fixed principles; consequently 



JOHN RANDOLPH. I97 

he had no political system. But government itself is a 
system, and can be successfully adminstered only when 
thus viewed. 

Mr. Randolph was also deficient in genuine philan- 
thropy ; when he became aware that in the course of nature 
he could not much longer enjoy the benefits of the labor 
of his slaves, professing a desire to improve their con- 
dition, to put them in the way of advancement, by mak- 
ing them free he directed in his will, that they should 
be removed to Ohio. The real motive to this direction 
was a desire to prevent others from having that benefit 
from their unrequited services, which he had enjoyed' 
when it was no longer in his reach. The result of his 
course in this matter was, that being wholly unprepared 
for freedom, unable to care properly for themselves, many 
of them became vagabonds, and even criminals ; and 
thus his pretended act of kindness was really one of 
selfishness and cruelty. 



198 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 




44apt<t ^ijjdt 



HENRY CLAY. 



jHE man who leaves his impress on a great nation, 

and imparts character to the age in which he 

lives, not only merits the regard of contemporaries, but 

will be a study for future generations. That Henry Clay 

occupies this position m the social state of mankind, by 

0/ a consideration of the past, and in the prospects of the 

^ future, will scarcely be questioned. His name, character 

^ and history are identified with the history of his country, 

and the student who makes himself acquainted with his 

life, private, professional, and public, will not be ignorant 

of the standing and career of the United States of North 

America, as one of the family of nations. Henry Clay 



HENRY CLAY. I99 

was born April 12, 1777, in Hanover county, Virginia, in 
a neighborhood commonly called the Slashes, a term 
indicating a district of country that abounds in low, 
swampy grounds. His father, the Rev. John Clay, also 
a native of Virginia, and his mother, Elizabeth Hudson, 
the younger of two daughters and only children of George 
Hudson, of Hanover county, had by this marriage eight 
children, three daughters and five sons, of whom Henry 
was the seventh, bearing the name of the second son, 
who had died. The daughters died in early woman- 
hood, two after marriage. George, the eldest child, lived to 
manhood, and died in Virginia. John, the sixth, removed 
to New Orleans, and died on the Mississippi. The Rev . 
Porter Cluy, the youngest of the family, was living at 
Jacksonville, Illinois, in 1844. The paternal ances- 
tors of Henry Clay were English. Branches of the fam- 
ily are ?Lill in the mother country, of which Sir William 
Clay, Bart., and member of the British House of Com- 
mons, is supposed to be one. The branch from which 
Henry Clay descended, removed to America some time 
after tne establishment of the colony of Virginia, and 
settled on the south side of James River. The descend- 
ants of the original Virginia stock, numerous and widely- 
dispersed, many of whom still reside in Virginia and 
Kentucky, have branched so extensively, that their com- 
mon origin is scarcely recognized among themselves. 
The Hudson family, on the maternal side of Mr. Clay's 
ancestry, also came from England, about the beginning 
of the eighteenth century, and settled in Hanover county, 
Virginia, where they remained till the above-named alii- 



200 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

ance with the Clay family was formed. Tradition alleges 
that the Rev. John Clay, the father of Henry, was a man 
of great vigor of character, of exemplary virtues, and 
of a nice and high sense of the decorums and proprieties 
of the social relations — not unlike the son, who has 
made the world familiar with the name of Clay. It is 
also in evidence, that the mother of Henry Clay was 
adorned with eminent female virtues, and that she con- 
tinued to interest herself in the fortunes ot Henry to the 
last of a good old age. The father died in 1781, be- 
queathing to his widow little else than an estate of seven 
children, Henry being then four years old. Obliged by 
her straightened circumstances to make the most of 
the ability of her children to help her, Mrs. Clay did 
not, however, neglect to send them to school. Henry's 
tuition, for the term ot about three years, was committed 
to the charge of one Peter Deacon, an Englishman, who 
came to America under a cloud, receiving occasional 
remittances from home, while he was employed for sev- 
eral years as the schoolmaster of the " Slashes," in which 
capacity he did himself credit, except that he would 
have done better, if teetotalism had begun in his days, 
and comprehended himself. His schojlhouse was made 
of a crib of logs, with no floor but the earth, the 
entrance serving for door, window, and air, it being 
always open. Under these somewhat inauspicious advan- 
tages, young Henry Clay was put forward by Peter 
Deacon, in his reading, writing, and arithmetic ; in the 
latter, to use Mr. Clay's own words, " as far as practice. " 
Mr. 'Clay's reminiscences of Peter Deacon do t.ie mas- 



HENRY CLAY. 20I 

ter much honor, though he says Peter once, in a fit of 
anger, gave him a magisterial blow, the mark of which 
he carriedia long time. " The mill boy of the Slashes, " 
which has kindled so much sentiment in the bosoms of 
the American people, the mimicry of which constituted 
a part of every public political pageant of the whig party 
in the presidential campaign of 1844, and which will 
still be poetic when the generation which first felt its 
power shall have passed away — which, indeed, will never 
cease to be so, while poetry is natural to man — had its 
foundation in the filial and fraternal duty of Henry Clay, 
who, after he was big enough, was seen, whenever the 
meal-barrel was low, going to and fro on the road 
between his mother's house and Mrs. Darricott's mill on 
the Pamunkey River, mounted on a bag that was thrown 
across a pony that was guided by a rope bridle ; and 
thus he became familiarly known by the people living on 
the line of travel, as "The mill-boy of the Slashes." 
Mrs. Clay, mother of Henry, was married a second 
time to Captain Henry Watkins, a man not unworthy of 
her, who seems to have taken a fatherly interest in the 
family. He was partial to Henry, and doubtless per- 
ceived that he was a boy of uncommon promise. In 
1 791, when Henry was fourteen years of age, he was 
taken into Mr, Richard Denny's store, at Richmond, 
Va., for the usual function of boys behind the counter 
It does not appear that his education at this time ex- 
tended further than his graduation at the log school- 
house, under the respectable Peter Deacon. It may be 
presumed, however, from what subsequently appears of 



202 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

the boy's character, that he riade the best of his oppor- 
tunities, while Peter was teaching his young ideas how to 
shoot. But his step-father was not at all satisfied with 
Henry's place in Mr. Denny's store, judging hin , very 
likely, to be deserving of a higher destiny than that of 
a tradesman It is remarkable by what slight causes and 
apparently crivial agencies a man's course of life is 
determined. Henry Clay would no doubt have made a 
good merchant, and a respectable citizen of Richmond, 
or any other town. But Captain VVatkins had an inti- 
mate friend. Colonel Thomas Tinsley, member of the 
Virginia House of Burgesses, whose brother, Peter Tins- 
ley, Esq., was Clerk of the High Court of Chancery of 
Virginia, at Richmond. A desk clerkship in the office 
of this court was considered a* very desirable place for 
a youth. Nothing was more natural, or more easy, than 
for Captain Watkins to make interest with his friend, 
Colonel Tinsley, that he might apply to his brother to 
take Henry into his office. Peter Tinsley replied that 
there was no openng for the lad " Never mind, " said 
the colonel, "you must take him, " and so he did. The 
account given by Roland Thomas, the senior clerk in 
this office, of Henry's first entrance among them, is 
interesting. The first impression of the other clerks was, 
that they were to have a fine butt for ridicule, and that 
no little fun was in store for them. The boy's face was 
not over handsome, whatever might lie under the surface ; 
nor had his manners yet been transformed into the 
urbanities of Richmond, though he had been in Mr. 
Denny's store about a year. His mother had dressed 



HENRY CLAY. 203 

him up in a new suit of " figging Virginia cloth," cotton 
and silk mixed, complexion of pepper and salt, with 
clean linen, well starched, and the tail of his coat stand- 
ing out from his legs, at an angle of forty-five degrees, 
like that of a dragoon. The clerkslooked askance at each 
other, and were not a little amused at the apparently awk- 
ward chap who had been thrust in upon them. Thus 
accoutred, and thus observed, the willing, ambitious, and 
somewhat proud boy, was first put to the task of copying. 
It was not long, however, before these laughers at first 
appearances came in contact with the mind of this new 
comer. He had a tongue, and could reply. Luckily for 
them, they had not proceeded to any rudeness, nor given 
occasion of offence, before their first impressions were 
supplanted by sentiments of respect. Whatever they said 
to him he was always ready for, and they soon found that 
he was more than a match for any one of them. Superior 
intellect easily acquires its position in any society, whether 
of boys, youth or men. Though the youngest clerk, he 
was not long in gaining the highest place in the regard 
of his fellows. Besides Henry's assiduous attention to 
his duties m the office, '*Ir. Thomas, afterward clerk of 
Henry county, Kentucky , has been accustomed to speak 
of his habits out of the office, when in command of his 
own time, from which it appears, that, while the other 
clerks habitually went out in pursuit of amusement at 
night, Henry kept company with his books ; that, when 
they came home, they found him reading and that they left 
him reading when they went to bed. This habit, certified 
to by Mr. Thomas during his life, is a material fact in solv- 



204 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

ing the problem of Mr. Clay's subsequent character and 
history. The boy of fifteen, and the youth of eighteen, 
may easily be seen, in imagination, as was the fact, at that 
table, with his book and candle, night after night, the year 
out and the year in, unseduced, and incapable of being 
seduced by his fellows to the theatre or the billiard-room, 
or to other haunts of dissipation. His fellowship was of 
another kind, pure, elevated, instructive, hallowed. He 
communed with the recorded wisdom of ages — of all 
mankind. 

About this time, Mr. Clay became acquainted with 
Chancellor Wythe, and was employed by him as an 
amanuensis in recording his decisions. The connection 
thus formed continued four years ; it proved to be mutu- 
ally agreeable and reciprocally beneficial. Henry Clay 
found a father in the Chancellor, and the Chancellor 
found a useful scribe and apt scholar in Henry Clay. It 
was in this connection that Henry Clay's mind received 
its high destination. The Chancellor's society and guid- 
ance were to him at the same time a school of the classics, 
of belles-lettres, of law, of history and of every useful 
department of learning to which the taste and ambition 
of his young friend were inclined ; and the habitual con- 
nexion between them was as that of father and son, of 
master and pupil. The stages which led to this relation 
have been observed ; but the relation itself was the plat- 
form of Henry Clay's fortunes. It introduced him to a 
new sphere of thought and improvement. The Chancel- 
lor not only became attached to him, but, perceiving his 
uncommon capacities, prompted him to aspire to the legal 



HENRY CLAY. 205 

profession, gave him the use of his hbrary, and superin- 
tended his reading. For a youth of such slender attain- 
ments, the tasks of this untried position, in which his 
ambition prompted him to desire approbation, were 
somewhat formidable. A good clerk could easily perform 
the functions of an amanuensis, but technical law-phrases, 
in languages to him unknown, were not easy for a boy to 
manage, who had never seen such words before. But the 
Chancellor knew his httle man ; had not chosen him for 
his high attainments, but for his high promise ; patiently 
bore the inconveniences of his imperfect qualifications, 
and soon began to realize his expectations in the rapid 
advances of his secretary in the accomplishments of a 
scholar. It has commonly been supposed that Mr. 
Clay's education was not only deficient, but unfor- 
tunate. He, himself, speaks of his " neglected edu- 
cation," improved by his own irregular exertions, 
without the benefit of systematic instruction." The facts 
here stated are undoubtedly true ; but the supposed 
defects, naturally and usually resulting from imperfect 
culture, are not necessarily implied. On the contrary, 
it may be true, that the very irregularities of Mr. Clay's 
early education were, in his case, fortunate. For such a 
self-relying mind, impelled by the necessity of his condi- 
tion and circumstances, the promptings of his taste, the 
stimulus of his aspirations, and the guidance he so for- 
tunately met with, were probably better than the best 
schools of " systematic instruction. " Genius does not 
so much require tuition as scope and opportunity. Put 
it in possession of one element of science, and all afiini- 



2o6 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

ties cluster around it by attraction. It catches knowl- 
edge as it flies, builds up accretions of thought on every 
simple idea that comes within its reach, makes one a 
parent of a thousand others, and runs in quest of all 
their relations till ascertained. The advantages which 
Henry Clay enjoyed, under the pedagogue of the 
" Slashes, " were certainly not very great; nor was his 
year in the store of Mr. Denny very improving. But 
the moment he entered the office of the clerk of the high 
court of chancery of Virginia, he began to find his own 
element; and from the hour when Chancellor Wythe 
took him by the hand, his fortune was decided, and he 
was made for life. He required nothing but chance, 
opportunity, means, books, and the right books ; and no 
man could have been a better guide than he into whose 
hands he so happily fell. In the choice of an amanuen- 
sis, the chancellor found a companion, though a stripHng. 
He beheld in this youth the genius of an aspiring, all- 
grasping mind — a mind which he could not lead, him- 
self before, but only guide and prompt, himself behind. 
He had only to name a book to his pupil, and the next 
time he saw him he would find him not only possessed 
of its contents, but profoundly versed in them, and 
extending his thoughts far beyond his instructors. The 
youth did not invoke the keepers of knowledge to let 
him into their secrets, but he marched straight into their 
wide domains, as to the possession of his native rights. 
If any one would know how and where Henry Clay laid 
the foundation of his greatness and fame, he is answered 
in the facts that he was for years the pupil and compan- 



Henry clay, 207 

ion of Chancellor Wythe, with all the advantages of his 
own aptitudes for improvement, and that the chancellor, 
discovering the high promise of his protege, was not less 
ambitious to fit him for his destiny than he himself was 
to attain to it. Possibly Henry Clay might have done 
better under the " systematic instructions " of a univer- 
sity ; but that is not certain. There may be reasons for 
supposing that the school he enjoyed was the best possi- 
ble for his disposition and character, and for the destina- 
tion of his future life. It is even possible, that without 
this course of training, he would have lived and died 
unknown to fame. Who ever discovered Mr. Clay's 
defects of education? The only man who ever dared to 
taunt him on that account, was the Hon. John Ran- 
dolph, on the floor of Congress, to which Mr. Clay 
replied : " The gentleman from Virginia was pleased to 
say, that in one point, at least, he coincided with me, in 
an humble estimate of my grammatical and philological 
acquisitions. I know my deficiencies. I was born to no 
proud patrimonial estate. I inherited only infancy, igno- 
rance and indigence. I feel my defects. But, so far as 
my situa'ion in early life is concerned, I may, without 
presumption, say it was more my misfortune than my 
fault. But, however I regret my want of ability to fur- 
nish the gentleman with a better specimen of powers of 
verbal criticism, I will venture to say, it is not greater than 
the disappointment of this committee as to the strength 
of his argument. " It is easy to conceive that the pure 
and lofty ambition of a modest, but self-relying mind, 
placed in such circumstances, as Henry Clay was under 



2o8 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

Chancellor Wythe, should fir outstrip the ordinary 
attainments of the students of Universities, while it 
escapes the contaminations and other impediments 
which too often mar the character, and prove fatal to 
the prospects of youth enjoymg such advantages. The 
influence of the venerable chancellor, on. such a mind as 
Henry Clay's, at that period of his life, must have been 
not less hallowing and conservative in its effects upon 
the morals of his pupil, than inspiring to his best feelings . 
The benefits ot the private tuition of such a master, to 
such a scholar, might, and probably did, far transcend 
the most select advantages that could have been provided 
by an ample fortune. 

There is one item of Mr. Clay's history at Richmond 
of a very interesting and practical nature, and especially 
worthy of notice, as constituting one of the primary im- 
pulses to that elevated career through which he has 
passed, with so much splendor, as an American orator. 
Ever prone to high aims and lofty pursuits, not less in 
childhood and youth than in riper years, his example 
and habitual occupation, had been the means of exciting 
a spirit of mental improvement among his associates j 
and chiefly through his influence, as is understood, a 
rhetorical society was formed, composed of young 
gentlemen of Richmond, for purposes of recitation and 
debate. Among the names of the members were Edwin 
Burrell, Littelton W. Tazewell, Walter Jones, John C. 
Herbert, Bennett Taylor, Philip N. Nicholas, Edmund 
W. Root, Thomas B. Robinson, and others, most of 
whom have since risen to eminence, and occupied distin- 



HENRY CLAY. 209 

guished stations. The existence and reputation of this 
society constituted an era in the history of the city of 
Richmond, and Henry Clay was its animating spirit, and 
the star that gave it lustre. It was the pride of the com- 
munity, and the gossip of all circles. Much and various 
talent was there developed ; but it will easily be believed, 
by those who have witnessed the ascendency of Henry 
Clay in the councils of the nation, that he was not less 
prominent in the first theatre that was opened for the 
development and display of his powers. His example, 
his success, and the enchantments of his eloquence, in- 
fused a spirit of young ambition among all the members 
and attracted the attention of the whole city. It is 
natural to suppose that the distinction he acquired in the 
recitations and debates of the society, was generally 
regarded as the herald of his future fame. It was there 
he first began to feel and know his own powers. He 
was leader there, as he ever has been in all places and 
stations. The exquisite pleasure a youth must feel, occu- 
pying such a position, and the dawning hopes clustering, 
and sparkling on his prospects, can be conceived only by 
those young minds that have found themselves in similar 
circumstances. No tongue ever sullied his name while 
a resident of Richmond. The boy who always had a 
book in hand, while other boys played ; the youth who 
was delving after knowledge, while other youh were 
dissipating time in ill-chosen pleasures, could not easily 
be spoken against. But all this while, Henry Clay, by 
his occupations and good behavior, and by the manifest- 
ation of his inclinations, was ingratiating himself in the 

J5 



2IO REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

favor of superior minds, and of persons of high standing. 
Though he left Richmond while yet a minor, his charac- 
ter and reputation had introduced him to the notice and 
acquaintance of Edmund Pendleton, Spencer Roane, 
Bushrod Washington, John Marshall, Wickham, Cobell, 
Copeland, and many other distinguished men of 
Virginia, who deemed themselves honored then, 
as ever since, by the relation. Gentlemen of this class, 
who were much his seniors, and the members of the 
rhetorical society, who were his equals, constituted a 
nucleus of that extended acquaintance and elevated 
society which grew upon him, and by which he was hon- 
ored in after life. Henry Clay did not leave Richmond 
for the great theatre of the west, with a dubious reputa- 
tion. Eyes and hearts followed him that knew what to 
expect ; and they were not disappointed. After a year's 
study of the law with Attorney- General Brooke, who had 
been Governor of the State, Mr. Clay was admitted to 
practice in 1797, by the Virginia Court of Appeals. That 
high finish of intellectual character, and those rich treas- 
ures of practical information, for which Mr. Clay has 
always been distinguished, had their foundation, no 
doubt, in that course of culture and discipline ; and in 
those severe studies and patient researches, into which he 
was put by Chancellor Wythe, and which were followed 
up under Attorney- General Brooke. The rich fruits, 
however, were indebted to the soil as well as to the hand 
that trained them. A mind intent on knowledge, and 
loving knowledge, not only for its own sake, but for its 
uses, needs but an index, the key, and the opportunity. 



HENRY CLAY. 2 I I 

It is true that the limits of Mr. Clay's education were 
somewhat circumscribed as to time; but ihe aids he 
enjoyed were of the highest order, the resources abund- 
ant, and he was enticed to effort and stimulated to appli- 
cation, not less by the seductive kindness of those who 
took an interest in him, than by the strong impulses of 
his own disposition. Time is a deceptive measure of 
acquirements in knowledge. It is facility, motive, talent, 
and help — the charm of the occupation, and the delig.its 
of circumstances. In the case of Henry Clay, the pupil 
was a genius, and the master a mentor. It is rare that 
young men enter upon professional life with such rich 
and various information, and with so fixed a habit of 
correct observation. He removed to Lexington, Ken- 
tucky, in November, 1797, to establish himself in the 
profession of the law, being then not quite twenty-one 
years of age. 

The following brief and touching review of his early 
history was given by himself, in a speech at Lexington, 
June 6, 1842, at an entertainment in honor of him, by 
his old friends and neighbors, on the occasion of his 
retirement from public life : " In looking back upon my 
origin and progress through life, I have great reason to 
be thankful. My father died in 1781, leaving me an 
infant of too tender years to retain any recollection of 
his smiles or endearments. My surviving parent removed 
to this State in 1792, leaving me, a boy of fifteen years of 
age, in the office of the High Court of Chancery, in the 
city of Richmond, without guardian, without pecuniary 
means of support, to steer my course as I might or could. 



212 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

I studied law principally in the office of a lamented friend, 
the late Governor Brooke, then Attorney-General of Vir- 
ginia, and also under the auspices of the venerable and 
lamented Chancellor Wythe, for whom I had acted as 
amanuensis. I obtained a license to practice the profession, 
from the judges of the Court of Appeals of Virginia, and 
established myself in Lexington, in 1797, without patrons, 
without the favor or countenance of the great or opulent, 
without the means of paying my weekly board, and in 
the midst of a bar uncommonly distinguished by eminent 
members. I remembe; how comfortable I thought I 
should be if I could make one hundred pounds, Virginia 
money, per year, and with what delight I received the 
first fifteen shillings fee. My hopes were more than real- 
ized. I immediately rushed into a successful and lucra- 
tive practice." 

Born and cradled in the agonies of the American revo- 
lution, Henry Clay seems to have been destined by 
Providence to sympathize with its great principles of free- 
dom, and to be the leading champion of human rights 
for the age in which he has lived. It is natural and not 
unphilosophical to suppose, more especially as it coincides 
with their reputed character, that the feelings of his 
parents, in view of British despotism over the colonies at 
that period of strife and blood, were imparted to the tem- 
perament of a son, who has ever shown himself so sus- 
ceptible of hate to tyrants, and so prone to the love of 
liberty. 

Mr. Clay, in all his domestic relations, has sustained 
through life, an exemplary and spotless reputation, as a 



HENRY CLAY. 213 

husband, father, and master. During his long public 
career, himself the observed of all observers, few, away 
from Lexington and the neighborhood, have ever heard 
anything of his family, simply because everything there 
was as it should be. It has been a quiet history, because 
it has been without fault, and without ostentation. In all 
political contests in which Mr. Clay was personally before 
the people, he never failed to receive a decided and over- 
whelming majority ; m Lexington, in Fayette county, in 
his own Congressional District, and the nearer home, the 
greater the majority. It was never so great, when he 
was a candidate, as in the Presidential election of 1844. 
The reciprocal regard is well illustrated, in the following 
passage from his valedictory to the Senate of the United 
States, delivered March 31, 1842 : 

"Everyhere, throughout the extent of this great con- ^ 
tinent, I have cordial, warm-hearted, and devoted frienjj^ 
who have known me and justly appreciated my motives. 
To them, if language were susceptible of fully expressing 
my acknowledgments, I would now offer them, as all the 
return I can now make for their genuine, disinterested, 
and persevering fidelity, and devoted attachment. But, if 
I fail in suitable language to express my gratitude to them 
for all the kindness they have shown me, what shall I say, 
what can I say, at all commensurate with those feelings 
of gratitude, which I owe to the State whose humble rep- 
resentative and servant I have been in this chamber? 
[Here Mr. Clay's feelings appeared to overpower him, 
and he proceeded with deep sensibility and difficult 
utterance.] I emigrated from the State of Virginia to the 



2 14 KEMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

State of Kentucky, now nearly forty-five years ago. I 
went as an orphan, who had not yet attained the age of 
majority, who had never recognized a father's smile, nor 
felt his caresses — poor, penniless, without the favor of the 
great ; with an imperfect and inadequate education, limit- 
ed to the ordinary business and common pursuits of Ufe. 
But scarcely had I set my foot upon her generous soil, 
when I was seized and embraced with parental fondness, 
caressed as though I had been a favorite child, and 
patronized with liberal and unbounded munificence. 
From that period, the highest honors of the State have 
been freely bestowed upon me ; and afterward, in the 
deepest hour of calumny and detraction, when I seemed 
to be forsaken by all the rest of the world, she threw her 
broad and impenetrable shield around me, and bearing 
me up aloft, in her courageous arms, repelled the pois- 
oned shafts that were aimed at my destruction, and vin- 
dicated my good narne from every false and unfounded 
aspersion. I return with indescribable pleasure, to linger 
a while lunger, and mingle with the warm-hearted and 
whole-souled people of that State , and, when the last 
scene shall forever close upon me, I hope that my earthly 
remains will be laid under the green sod with those of 
her gallant and patriotic sons." 

On the :5th of December, 1844, the electoral college 
of Kentucky, after having the day previous, cast their 
suffrages for Henry Clay, as President of the United 
States, accompanied by the Governor of the State, paid 
their respects in a body to Mr. Clay at Ashland, without 
notice, except by a message sent up in the morning. 



HENRY CLAY. 215 

Numerous citizens from Lexington formed in the proces- 
sion, which was escorted from the city by a company of 
artillery, suddenly mustered as volunteers for the occasion. 
Mr. Clay met them, uncovered, on the steps of his man- 
sion, as they, being also uncovered, drew up to exchange 
salutations. It was not to congratulate him, nor to mingle 
rejoicings in the triumphs of right, or in the happy pros- 
pects of the country ; but to show the steadfastness of 
their regard, and their respect for his character. They 
wept — how could they help it? — as the Hon. J. R. 
Underwood, their organ, gave utterance to their senti- 
ments, the conclusion of which was as follows : 

" In the shades of Ashland, may you long continue to 
enjoy peace, quiet, and the possession of those great facul- 
ties which rendered you the admiration of your friends, 
and the benefactor of your country. And, when, at last, 
death shall demand its victim, while • entucky will 
contain your ashes, rest assured, that old and faithful 
friends, those who, knowing you longest, loved you best, 
will cherish your memory, and defend your reputation." 

That it should have been a struggle, even for Mr. 
Clay, to reply to this address, may well be imagined. 
With a manly spirit, however, though not without falter- 
ing, he enacted his part. It is unnecessary to mention, 
what is known to all the world, how Mr. Clay's sympa- 
thies have expanded to embrace the oppressed of all 
nations, or how effectively those feelmgs have been 
exerted in the eminent and influential positions he has 
occupied, to extend the domain of freedom, in South 
America, in Greece, and elsewhere. The early, zealous, 



2 l6 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

and solitary movement which he made in Congress, in 
behalf of the South American States, while struggling for 
independence, will stand forever as a monument of his 
active sympathy for suffering and oppressed humanity. 
The gallantry, the chivalric character of his speeches in 
Congress, in favor of those States, has been felt over the 
wide world. He had freely expressed himself on this 
subject in 1816 and 1817. On the 24th of January, 
18 1 7, speaking in opposition to the bill to enforce neutral- 
ity, the object of which was, in deference to the Spanish 
government, to put a stop to the building of armed 
vessels in the ports of the United States, to be sold to 
the South American States, and which added two new 
principles to the law of 1 794, Mr Clay said: — 

" From the inmost recesses of my heart, I wish them 
(the South American States) independence. I may be 
accused of an imprudent utterance of my feelings on 
this occasion. I care not. When the independence, the 
happiness, the liberty of a whole people is at stake, and 
that people our neighbors, our brethren, occupying a 
portion of the same continent, imitating our example, and 
participating in the same sympathies with ourselves, I 
will boldly avow my feelings, and my wishes in their 
behalf. " 

In supporting Mr. Webster's resolution to send an 
agent to Greece, in 1824, Mr. Clay said: " Go home, 
if you can — go home, if you dare, and tell your con- 
stituents, that you voted it down. Meet, if you can, 
the faces of those who sent you here, and tell them, that 
you shrank from the declaration of your own sentiments ; 



HENRY CLAY. 217 

that the spectres of cimiters, and crowns, and crescents, 
gleamed before you, and alarmed you ; and that you 
suppressed all the noble feelings prompted by religion, 
by liberty, by national independence, and by humanity. " 
The hospitalities of Ashland are sufficiently well known 
to the many distinguished strangers, who have visited 
Lexington since the beginning of the nineteenth 
century. Mr. Politica, Russian Minister, LaFayette, 
President Monroe, William Lowndes, Martin Van Buren, 
Daniel Webster, Lord Morpeth, General Bertrand, and 
many others known to fame, have been among the guests 
of Ashland. For twelve years speaker of the House of 
Representatives, Mr. Clay was accustomed to entertain 
at dinner once each session of Congress, in a series of 
parties, all the members of both houses, and the ambas- 
sadors of foreign countries. While Secretary of State, 
under Mr. Adams, the weekly levees were held alternately 
at the President's and Mr. Clay's. Mr. Clay was far from 
being opulent. His long service in public life, during 
which he had been poorly remunerated, prevented his 
acquiring wealth, of which he was not desirous, farther 
than to educate his children, maintain his family, and live 
hke his neighbors. His personal habits were not expen- 
sive, nor was there the least parade or ostentation in his 
dress, in his house, in his furniture or in his mode of 
living; but entire plainness in everything visible. He 
was always averse to contracting debts, keeping but few 
servants, and paying as he went. Never, for a moment, 
was he involved in any pecuniary difficulty on his own 
account ; but he was twice in his life seriously em. 



2l8 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

barrassed by responsibilities for others. His son made a 
conveyance of all his property, providing for an equal 
distribution of it among all his creditors, of whom his 
father was the largest, the debt to him amounting to as 
much as the aggregate of the debts to all the others. 
He voluntarily reHnquished his share in the common 
fund, to the other creditors, who were paid in full, while 
he received nothing. Always anxious to acquit himself 
with honor of every obligation, he felt the greatest sensi. 
bihty under this weight of debt, and would no doubt 
have parted with Ashland, to rid himself of it, but for 
the relief mentioned in the following letter: 

Northern Bank of Kentucky, ) 
Lexington, May 21, 1845. f 
" Dear Sir : — I am in receipt of your letter of the 
1 2th inst. Within the last two months, I have received 
from various sections of the United States, letters to my 
address, containing money, which I was requested to 
apply to the payment of Hon. H. Clay's debts, with no 
other information, than that it was a contribution by 
friends, who ov/ed him a debt of gratitude for services 
he had rendered his country in years past, and that they 
were desirious of rendering his declining years free 
from pecuniary cares. The amount received amounted 
to twenty-five thousand, seven hundred and fifty dollars. 
This, with the exception of five hundred dollars used 
for the same purpose through another channel, is the 
total. It was with some reluctance that Mr. Clay was 
induced to accept this relief; and I am convinced that 
the delicacy observed by the generous donors, had much 
influence in his decision. He is now measurably freed 
from debt, and his Ashland cleared of mortgages. We 
trust it will continue to be the residence of its noble 
owner, and that Providence will long spare his life for 
his country and friends. I am, dear sir, 

Respectfully yours, 
" C. Colton, Esq.''' Jno. Tilford. 



HENRY CLAY. 2 19 

It was reported in the public press, that Mr. Clay 
asked Mr. Tilford with emotion, " Who did this ? " To 
which lUr. Tilford replied:' " Sir, I do not know. It is 
sufficient to say that they are not your enemies. " 

In regard to Mr. Clay's religious sentiments, he said 
in Congress, " I am a member of no religious sect, and 
I am not a professor of religion. I regret that I am 
not. I wish that I was, and I trust that I shall be. I 
have, and always have had, a profound regard for 
Christianity, the religion of my father, and for its rites, 
its usages and its observances. " In Mr. Clay's speech 
before the Kentucky Colonization Society, at Frankfort, 
1829, speaking of the time required for the accomplish- 
ment of great and good ends, he said: — " Eighteen hun- 
dred years have rolled away since the Son of God, our 
Blessed Redeemer, offered himself on Mount Calvary, 
for the salvation of our species ; and more than half of 
mankind still continue to deny his Divine mission, and 
the truth of his sacred word. Throughout the entire 
existence of Christianity, it has been a favorite object of 
its ardent disciples, and pious professors, to diffuse its 
blessings by converting the heathen. This dut> is 
enjoined by its own sacred precepts, and prompted by 
considerations of humanity. All Christendom is more or 
less employed in this object, at this moment, in some 
part or other of the earth. But it must in candor be 
owned, that hitherto missionary efforts have not had a 
success corresponding in extent with the piety and 
benevolence of their aims, or with the amount of means 
which have been applied. Some new and more effica- 



2 20 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

cious mode of accomplishing the beneficent purpose, 
must be devised, which, by concentrating energies and 
endeavors, and avoiding loss in their diffuse and uncom- 
bined application, shall insure the attainment of more 
cheering results." Mr. Clay concluded his speech on this 
occasion as follows : 

" We have reason to believe, that we have been hith- 
erto favored, and shall continue to be blessed, with the 
smiles of Providence. Confiding in his approving judg- 
ment, and conscious of the benevolence and purity of our 
intentions, we may fearlessly advance in our great work. 
And when we shall, as soon we must, be translated from 
this into another form of existence, is the hope presump- 
tuous, that we shall behold the common Father of whites 
and blacks, the great Ruler of the Universe, cast his all- 
seeing eye upon civilized and regenerated Africa, its 
cultivated fields, its coasts studded with numerous cities, 
adorned with towering temples, dedicated to the pure 
religion of His redeeming Son ?" 

" I have waited, " said Mr. Clay, in his valedictory to 
the Senate, 1842, " in perfect and undoubting confidence, 
for the ultimate triumph of justice and truth, and in the 
entire persuasion, that time would, in the end, settle all 
things as they should be, and that whatever wrong or 
injustice I might experience at the hands of man. He, to 
whom all hearts are open and fully known, would, in the 
end, by the inscrutable dispensations of his providence, rec- 
tify all error, redress all wrong, and cause ample justice to 
be done." On a Sunday evening, sometime after the result 
of the Presidential election of 1844 was known, while sit- 



HENRY CLAY. 221 

ting at his own fireside, with two friends, the dark spor- 
pects of the country being a topic of conversation, he said, 
pointing with his finger to the Bible, which lay on the 
table — the only book there, showing the use that had 
been made of it : " Gentlemen; I do not know anything 
but that book, that can reconcile us to such events." 

The following letter explains itself: 

Ashland, March 7, 1845. 

" Dear Sir :— I have received your obliging letter, 
informing me, that, by the contribution of two ladies of 
Baltimore, of the requisite sum for the purpose, I have 
been made a member for life, of the Baltimore Sabbath 
Association. As you do not inform me of the names of 
the ladies, I must request you to be my organ to commu- 
nicate to them my respectful acknowledgements for this 
proof of their valued regard and esteem, and to assure 
them, that I share with them in sentiments of profound 
reverence for the Sabbath, as a religious institution, and 
that 1 fervently hope, that all laudable endeavors to mcul- 
cate the proper observance of it, may be crowned with 
success. 

" I have also to thank you for a copy of the pamphlet, 
containing the proceedings of the Associat on, which you 
forwarded to me. 

" I am, with high respect, your obedient servant, 

H. Clay. 

'■'■Charles W. Ridgeley. Esq:' 

In 1822, a commission, composed of Mr. Clay and 
Mr. Bibb, was appointed by the Legislature of Kentucky, 
to confer with the Legislature of Virginia, for the adjust- 
ment of long-standing difficulties between the two States, 
in regard to land titles. When Kentucky was a part of 
Virginia, the mother commonwealth had neglected to 
make suitable regulations for the first occupants of her 



222 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

western domain. The consequence was, that emigrants, 
moving over the mountains, and settling down on the 
vacant, wild and unsurveyed lands, after having estab- 
lished themselves well in the world, and got their families 
about them, were surprised by other claimants of their 
farms, and driven from them by actions of ejectment. 

Kentucky had passed an act, termed the ' occupying 
claimant law, " by which the occupant of lands for seven 
years should have the right to acquire a perfect title to 
them by having a jury empaneled to determine the value 
of the land, which value thus ascertained and paid to 
the legal owner of the land, or tendered to him, should 
give to the occupant the legal title. Most of those 
lands were owned by citizens of Virginia; hence the 
mission of Messrs. Clay and Bibb to induce Virginia to 
sanction the act of the Legislature of Kentucky. The 
Legislature of Virginia was composed partly of the 
owners of these lands, acquired by inheritance, or pur- 
chase, and preferred to retain them for future use, or dis- 
posal. Mr. Clay was aware that a son of Patrick Henry 
was a member of the legislature, a nephew of James 
Madison, also a member, and some fifteen or twenty 
descendants, and relatives of Judges Pendleton, Wythe, 
and Roane, and hence the peculiar character of his 
exordium. He said: " I arise, Mr. Speaker, with emotions 
of unusual embarrassment, remembering that within 
these walls was once heard the eloquence of a Henry 
who gave the first impetus to the Revolutionary ball; 
that upon this floor stood a Madison, whose resolutions 
of ninety-eight, have erected an imperishable monument 



HENRY CLAY. 223 

of glory to his memory ; that once presided in that chair, 
the illustrious, the accomplished, the distinguished Pen- 
dleton; aided by the venerable Wythe, like Cato, firm, like 
Aristides, just. I would consent, sir, that Spencer Roane 
himself should decide this subject, and the gentleman 
must pardon me for presumption. " He depicted, with a 
glowing pencil, the hard fate of those, whose cause he 
came to plead, and whose misfortunes were the result of 
neglect in the parent state. He gave the history of the 
pioneer, from the time of his migration westward till he had 
acquired a comfortable independence ; showing that, as an 
enterprising, but poor man, he had gone over the Alle- 
ghanies, with nothing but his own stout heart and strong 
arm ; that he had encountered exposures to wild beasts, 
and to the insidious wiles of the savage ; that in reliance 
on the faith of the Commonwealth of Virginia, he had 
chosen his lands, cut away the forest, erected his cabin, 
married his wife, reared his family, and imagined, that he 
was lord of his own domain ; and that, sitting there, 
with all needful things about him, rich as his heart de- 
sired, his flocks and herds grazing in his fields, his chil- 
dren joyous, and the wife of his bosom partaker of all 
his proud satisfaction, in posession of an adequate in- 
heritance for their offspring, they are suddenly notified, 
that this estate is not theirs, but another's. In this way 
Mr. Clay painted in lively colors the hardships and suf- 
ferings of the Western pioneer ; his separation from the 
spot of his birth, from his early neighbors, his friends, 
his relations, the graves of his ancestors ; his removal to a 
distant wilderness, full of perils, and his privations. The 



224 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGtTISHED MEN. 

feelings of his audience, and his own feelings, were 

deeply affected. In the progress of this appeal, a faint 

reminiscence of some lines of the bard and romancer of 

North Britain, struck his mind, and he began to quote 

them: 

" Lives there a man — " 

But his memory, which rarely failed, was this time 
at fault. He paused a moment, closed his eyes, and 
pressed his forehead with the palm of his hand, 
to aid his recollection. Fortunately for him his audi- 
ence supposed that this pause and act were occa- 
sioned by the depth and power of his emotions, which 
certainly were deep and powerful, and so were theirs. 
The lines came to him in good time, and when he pro- 
nounced the words in the most feeling manner — 

"Lives there a man, so cold and dead, 
Who never to himself hath said, 
This is my own, mj^ native land ?" 

there was a profound sensation pervading the assembly, 

which was manifested in many instances by involuntary 

tears. 

Mr. Clay was the beau-ideal of a demagogue, in the 
good sense of the term. That is, he was a leader of the 
people ; a leader in the same way that the foremost 
horses arc leaders in a coach and six. 

They are in advance of all the rest, and of the driver 
himself, who sits upon the box, and directs their course. 
In this country, it is said, the people rule. Mr. Clay 
was a man of great sagacity, and intuitive knowledge of 
men. He could discern the rise and formation of the 
great waves of public sentiment ; he had a genius for 



HENRY CLAY. 225 

riding upon the very crest of the wave, and thus seeming 
to be a great leader. A.nd so he was, but a leader who 
guided and illustrated without creating the great move- 
ments of public opinion. For this he was admirably 
fitted by his winning and not too fastidious manners, by 
his persuasive and honeyed oratory, which never 
severely taxed the thought of the auditor ; and by his 
ability to adapt himself to all companies and tastes. 




226 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 




^^mkt '^kt 



HON. THOMAS EWING. 



BECAME acquainted with Mr. Ewmg in Jan- 
uary, 1826, at Lancaster, Ohio, and travelled 
with him on horseback to Columbus. We were together 
two weeks, during which time I had an opportunity of 
appreciating his great abilities, his extensive learning, his 
classic taste, and his wit, sparkling with Attic salt, to 
which I alluded in the preceeding pages of my Autobi- 
ography. 

The following sketch of Mr. Ewing by the Hon. 
Henry Stanbery is so superior to any thing I might 
write of Mr Ewing, that I determined to transcribe it 
here as an act of simple justice to Mr. Ewing. I may 
add, however, that if all else that Mr. Ewing has written 



THOMAS EWING. 227 

were erased from the page of history, his definition of 
the Christian religion is so comprehensive, so concise, so 
true, so eloquent, that it alone would have given immor- 
tality to his name. It is as follows : " The Christian 
religion is emphatically the philosophy of the unlettered 
man. It teaches him by the direct speakings of revela- 
tion, what philosophy in all ages has sought to discover, 
and comprehend— the duty of man to God — to himself 
— to his fellow-man ; the mystery of his origin, his being 
and condition here, and the deeper and darker mystery 
of his final destiny. " 

The family of Thomas Ewing resided, prior to the 
Revolutionary war, near Greenwich, Cumberland county, 
New Jersey, where the old family mansion is still to be 
seen. George Ewing, the father of the subject of this 
sketch, was born there in 1754. In 1775, he enlisted 
in the New Jersey Line, where he obtained the rank of 
lieutenant. He was present at the battles of German- 
town and Brandy wine, and spent the winter of 1777 at 
the memorable camp of Valley Forge. While in the 
army, he sold, on credit, the property which had 
descended to him, and when his bonds became due, was 
paid in Continental money, then a legal tender, though 
rapidly depreciating, and which soon after became 
totally valueless. 

Thus reduced in circumstances, he removed to the 
western side of the Alleghanies in 1786, and settled on a 
small farm near West Liberty, Ohio county, Virginia, 
where Thomas Ewing was born, on the 28th day of 
December, 1789. In April, 1792, the family removed to 



228 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

the mouth of Olive Green Creek, on the Muskingum 
river. In the year 1795, the Indians rising in all direc- 
tions, they were obliged to take refuge in a block-house, 
at Olive Green, to avoid the danger of being massacred. 
An elder sister had taught young Ewing to read ; and 
while he was in the garrison, he very assiduously culti- 
vated acquaintance with almost the only book it afforded 
— the Bible — and acquired therefrom the cognomen of 
Bishop, which clung to him for many years. 

In 1797, he was taken to West Liberty, and there went 
to school about seven months, at the expiration of which 
time he returned to his father, who had then removed to 
the waters of Federal Creek, into what is now Athens 
county, Ohio. The spot selected by his father was then 
in the wilderness, and seventeen miles beyond the frontier 
settlements. Here, for nearly three years, they were shut 
out from any intercourse with the world. Young Ewing, 
during this time, read the " Vicar of Wakefield," and 
" Fool of Quality." These and the Bible were all the 
books which, up to that time, he had been able to pro- 
cure. 

In the year 1800, a few other families from New Eng 
land had settled on Federal Creek ; and in the winter of 
that year, a school was opened under the superintendence 
of Chas. Cutler, a Cambridge graduate, who was suc- 
ceeded by Moses Everett, from the same college. Ewing 
studied, one quarter under each, the rudiments of a 
common English education, and this was the total of his 
schooling until 18 12. This little enterprising community 
of New Englanders, that were then settled upon Federal 



THOMAS EWING. 229 

Creek, had but few books ; and to procure a further 
stock, they formed a library association, and raised a 
small fund by subscription. This literary fund (in all 
probability, the first that was ever formed in the North- 
western Territory) was sent to one of the Eastern cities, 
and invested in books. The whole collection was brought 
across the mountains on horseback in a sack. With the 
exception of Goldsmith's works, the books were not well 
selected, consisting principally of the novels then fashion- 
able, such as " Amanda," the " Romance of the Forest," 
and dull treatises on controversial doctrines of divinity. 
Subsequent additions were made to the library, among 
which were Plutarch's " Lives," Stewart's " Philosophy," 
Darwin's "Zoonomia," and Locke's "Essay on the Human 
Understanding." Young Ewing fell upon these with a 
literary avidity which none can understand but those who, 
under like circumstances, have felt it ; and he devoured 
the whole, reading at all his leisure hours, and principally 
at night by the light of hickory-bark. 

From the age of thirteen, the life of Ewing was labor- 
ious. Then he became a substantial assistant to his father 
upon his farm; and by-and-by he had the principal man- 
agement of it. Still, he found time to read, as all can 
find, who have thirst for knowledge ; but as he grew older, 
he had less time to read than when a boy. The little he 
had learned, however, but influenced him with a desire of 
learning more. The love of knowledge was the prevail- 
ing and all-absorbing passion of his soul. To be a scholar 
was then the summit of his highest ambition. He felt 
that he had acquired all the knowledge within his reach ; 



230 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

but this only taught him how little, in fact, he knew, and 
was far from allaying his burning thirst for knowing more. 
Knowledge there was, he knew, but how to reach it, was 
more than lie could tell. Poverty stared him in the face. 
The father and his farm, anchored him at home, but his 
buoyant spirits led him off on a thousand plans through 
many serial castles, and in many dehghtful visions. Cal- 
culations were made, but made in vain. Plans were 
formed, but they were soon but air. A world was abroad, 
but v/hat it was, the eager student hardly knew. And 
yet, the more he knew of it, the more he panted to act 
his part in it. But the more he thought of his situation, 
the more he despaired. Reflection at last ripened into 
actual suffering. His feelings became intensely interested. 
The bitter melancholy conclusion at las' was, that he 
must abandon all hopes forever. 

But in the summer of 1808, he was awakened from 
this stupor by a youth nearly of his own age, whom his 
father had hired for a few months to assist him in farm- 
ing, and who had rambled about and seen much of the 
world. The narrations of this young man, and many of 
his adventures, awakened Ewing ; and as money was what 
he wanted, in order to obtain the means of pursuing his 
studies, he was induced to go with him to the Kanawha 
salines, in Western Virginia, in order there to try his for- 
tune. He obtained the consent of his father, and left 
home early in August, with his knapsack on his back, 
and but little spending money in his pocket. He got on 
board a keel-boat at Marietta, bound for Kanawha, and 



THOMAS EWING. 23 1 

made his way to the new El Dorado of his imagination. 
During the three or four months he was absent, 
he worked as a common hand at the salt wells, 
and was tolerably successful ; but the greatest sat- 
isfaction he had was that he could do something in 
future. He returned home in the winter, with about 
eighty dollars, the amount of his wages, leavmg his com- 
panion behind, whose roving disposition prompted him 
to rove still more. This money Ewing gave to his 
father, to assist him in paying for his land. The surren- 
der of this little and hard earned treasure to his father 
for the purpose of enabling him to save his land from 
forfeiture was no ordinary sacrifice, as it postponed for a 
year all prospect of prosecuting his studies, and con- 
demned him, for a while, to stifle the high hopes he then 
nourished in his bosom. 

Early in the spring of 1809, Mr. Ewing set out again 
for the Kanawha salt-works. The whole ot this season, 
until November, he spent in most assiduous labor, and he 
succeeded well — the profits of the season being about four 
hundred dollars, out of which he appropriated sixty to pay 
the balance due on his father's land. He spent the 
winter at Athens, then a flourishing academy, but irregu- 
lar in the course of studies, as it left the student to 
pursue such a course as he might think proper. At the 
end of about three months, he left this ac idemy, and 
returned to Kanawha, after receiving there such encour- 
agement from the president of the institution, and such a 
stimulus from others, as fixed his .determination to pro- 
cure the means of obtaining an education. The next 



232 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

two years he devoted to this object ; and he returned 
from the Kanawha in November, 18 12, with about eight 
hundred dollars in money, and with his health consider- 
ably impaired with severe, hard labor. This sum he sup- 
posed would be sufficient to enable him to go through 
the preparatory studies, and acquire a profession. His 
health, however, was so much injured that he was una- 
ble to commence his studies. But he agam fell upon the 
library in the neighborhood of his home, which was now 
enlarged ; and, from the repose given him, and the leis- 
ure spent in reading such works as Don Quixote, he 
laughed himself into such good health and spirits that in 
December he was able to go back to Athens, where he 
continued to be a most indefatigeable student until the 
spring of 18 14. His progress during this time was very 
rapid. He became familiar with many of the best Eng- 
lish authors, and as his judgment matured, he easily 
obtained a knowledge of the English grammar, rhetoric, 
and logic. Mathematics, however, was his favorite study, 
for which he had a natural inclination, hence Euclid was 
the favorite author. The philosophy which depended 
upon mathematical demonstration he studied with care 
and pleasure, and in it made much proficiency. He also 
studied the Latin, but determined to omit the Greek. 

In 18 14 Mr. Ewing became satisfied that his funds 
would not hold out, and he took a school in GalHpolis. 
Not liking this employment, at the end of a quarter he 
relinquished it, and returned to Kanawha, the old scene 
of his labors, to collect a small sum that was due him, 
and to see what could be done towards adding something 



THOMAS EWING. 233 

to his funds. He threw off the dress of the student, and 
again went to work at the salines. He hired a furnace, 
and in one month of incessant toil, the severest he ever 
undertook, he improved the state of his finances so that 
he felt confident they would bear him through his studies . 
At some period of his labors at the Kanawha salt-works, 
— and it was probably this — he labored twenty hours out 
of the twenty-four, and he was often found, during the 
four hours alloted to sleep, workmg with open eyes, but 
still asleep, between the two rows of boiling salt kettles, 
where a false step would probably have destroyed life. 
With his hard-earned treasure, he returned to Athens? 
where he continued till the spring of 1815. At the 
examination in May, 1815, the trustees of the institution 
granted him the degree of A. B., he being the first, with 
one other, upon whom this degree was conferred in Ohio. 
The circumstances which decided Mr. K wing's choice 
of profession were probably these : In 18 10. he took a 
boat-load of salt to Marietta. While there, accident led 
him to the courthouse. The court of Common Pleas 
was then in session, and he entered a courthouse for the 
first time in his life. It happened that an interesting 
criminal trial was going on. The attention of the young 
salt-boiler was rivited to the scene ; nor did he quit the 
room until the case was closed. He had witnessed a high 
jntellectual effort — he had Hstened to an advocate (the 
late Elijah B. Merriam) of uncommon ability. Hitherto 
he had not known or felt the power of eloquence. We 
may suppose that along with his admiration of intel- 
lect in another, there was associated a consciousness of 



234 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

his own mental powers, and a feeling kindred to that 
which caused the untutored Correggio, after gazing for 
the first time upon the pictures of Raphael, to exclaim, 
" I, too, am a painter. " In truth, this must have been 
so, for he turned away to pursue his toilsome occupation 
with the fixed purpose of becoming a lawyer. After he 
left college, he spent a few days with his relations, and 
then began his legal studies in the office of Gen. Beecher, 
at Lancaster, Ohio, a man of sense and intelligence, and 
for several years a member of Congress from Ohio. 
Gen. Beecher discovered the merit and approved the 
efforts of Mr. Ewing. He received him as a student in 
his office, and immediately upon his admission to the 
bar, took him into partnership. While Mr. Ewing 
was pursuing his law studies, he was an indefatigable 
student, devoting to his books every hour that was not 
required for necessary repose. 

Mr. E wing's rise at the bar was rapid. He entered 
almost immediately into full practice in his region of the 
State. In keeping with the generous filial character 
he displayed in the appropriation of his first savings at 
Kanawha, he expended his first accumulations at the bar 
in the purchase of a fine tract of land in Indiana, on 
which he settled his father and family. As his powers 
and reputation grew apace, the area of his practice was 
extended to embrace, and was chiefly confined to the 
Supreme Court of Ohio, the Circuit Court of the United 
States for the District of Ohio and the Supreme Court of 
the United States, at Washington, in which he has been 
engaged with only occasional interruptions by high offi- 



THOMAS EWING. 235 

cial duties down to a recent time. He was distinguished 
at the bar for his sound logical mind, a clear conception 
and mastery of the general principles that underlie the 
system of the law, and a most comprehensive power of 
analysis and array of the facts bearing upon his case, to 
which may be added an extraordinary general know- 
ledge of the round of physical sciences — a great power 
in the hands of a lawyer — which has contributed its 
share in placing him in the front rank of the profession 
in the United States. 

Mr. Ewing finished his collegiate studies at so late a 
period, and was for some years thereafter so constantly 
devoted to his practice, that his attention was not early 
turned to political concerns. He entered upon poUtical 
Hfe, in his election in 1830, to the Senate ot the United 
States. Without family or political influence or aftiha- 
tions, his election to this high place was prompted by a 
strong and just sense of his eminent qualifications, hon- 
orable alike to the Legislature and the new Senator. In 
no period since the formation of the Government has the 
Senate Chamber been graced by a galaxy of minds more 
briUiant and powerful than in the first term that Mr. 
Ewing sat there. Webster, Clay, Calhoun, Benton, 
Wright, Preston, and other first names in the nation then 
filled the Senate, and it is no slight praise to say that the 
Ohio Senator lost nothing in the contrast ; the reputation 
that won for him the place was but augmented by the 
new theatre on which his powers were displayed. He 
bore a not inconspicuous part in the exciting political 
contests of the sessions from 1830-37 as an opponent of 



236 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

the adminisiration of General Jackson. Under the oper- 
ations of the strict party discipline, gaining force year by 
year, Mr. Ewing failed of a re-election, and at the end of 
his term resumed the full practice of his profession. 

On the accession of General Harrison to the Presi- 
dency, in 1 84 1, Mr. Ewing was next called into public 
notice by the invitation of the incoming President to a 
place in the Cabinet. The general voice Df the country 
designated him as the proper man for the organization of 
reform in the administration of the important department 
of the General Post-Office, but he was ultimately assigned 
to the more conspicuous and important place of the 
Treasury. The death of General Harrison brought Mr. 
Tyler into the Presidency, and, on his special invitation, 
the Harrison Cabinet remained in office, until the devel- 
opments of the memorable extra session of 184 1 disclosed 
to the world the violation on the part of Mr. Tyler, of all 
the pledges of the party that elected him to power, and 
the disappointment of the hopes grounded on its success. 
Mr. Ewing was prompt among his associates in the 
Cabinet in his election between an adherence to the 
principles and promises of his party on the one hand, and 
the allurements of place and power on the ©ther ; and the 
scathing letter of resignation with which he surrendered 
the keys of office, did much to mark the boundaries that 
separated the President from the true men of the party 
he had betrayed. 

In the formation of the Cabinet of General Taylor, in 
1849, by common voice a prominent place was assigned 
to Mr. Ewing. With a just appreciation of his qualifi- 



THOMAS EWING. 237 

cations for the important task, he was invited by the 
President to the charge of the new Department of the 
Interior, involving in its administration, beyond the ordi- 
nary duties of a Cabinet officer, the organization of a new 
department of many separate bureaus, and having charge 
of the public lands, the Indian affairs, and the Patent 
Office. He filled this post with honor and ability until 
August, 1850, when after the death of General Taylor and 
the accession of Mr. Fillmore, the Taylor Cabinet, failing 
to harmonize on certain important questions with the new 
President, resigned their offices. Mr. Ewing was there- 
upon appointed by Governor Ford to a seat in the Senate 
(vacated by the resignation of Governor Corwin, who 
went into Mr. Fillmore's Cabinet), and continued in the 
Senate until March 4th, 185 1, when he retired from 
political life, and resumed the practice of his profession. 
In person, Mr. Ewing was large and stoutly built, so 
that he was physically as well as intellectually a strong 
man. In his early hard labor in felling the forests of the 
west, and in feeding the furnace of the salt-works, his 
figure must have been developed and strengthened much 
more than if in early life he had been devoted wholly to 
sedentary pursuits ; and at the same time he was con- 
firmed in habits of industry that he never lost. His man- 
ner of speaking was not graceful, yet it commanded 
attention. He was powerful from his matter rather than 
his manner. Plain, open, straightforward, fearless, with 
little or no attempt at oratorical display, he laid hold 
with all his might upon whatever his hands found to do. 
His eye was fixed upon a point, and it was impossible to 



238 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

swerve him. Others there were more eloquent in man- 
ner than he; to whom nature had given finer voices or 
more captivating oratory ; but few were more powerful in 
thought, few with more resources, or who had more or 
better weapons in any logomachy tilt. He seemed to be 
well informed on every point that arose in debate, 
whether a matter of history, of philosophy, of poetry or ot 
criticism, thus showing that he had read much, and had 
not read in vain. How instructive is the life of such a 
man, and with what force does it commend itself to every 
young American, not only arousing him to exertion, but 
admonishing him to fix his ambition high, and to gratify 
it only in the path of virtue, integrity, and honor, and 
thus to win that reputation that abides and outlasts the 
corrosive rust of time. Honors ever seek him in the 
virtuous days of a republic, who deserves them ; but that 
is not honor which is won by meanness and intrigue at 
the cost of integrity and self-respect. Grovelling ambi- 
tion tarnishes and stains whatever it touches ; but an 
ambition like that which animated the bosom of Ewmg, 
dignifies and ennobles whatever it wins. 



WILLIAM C. RIVES. 239 



tx mr{. 




WILLIAM C. RIVES. 



alLLIAM Cabell Rives, was born in Nel- 
jA son County, Va., on the 4th of May, 1793, 
He received his collegiate education at Hampden Sidney. 
and William and Mary colleges. 

In 1809-U, he was a student of law, Hterature, science 
and politics under the direction of Thomas Jefferson ; 
in 18 1 2-13, a student of law in Richmond, in the office 
of Hon. George Hay. In 1814-15, he was A. D. C. 
on the staff of Gen. John Hartwell Cooke; in 1816, a 
member of the Staunton convention ; in 181 7-1 8-1 9 and 



240 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

20 a member of the Virginia House of Delegates, from 
Nelson County; in 1822-23, a member of the Virginia 
House of Delegates from Albermarle County. From 
1823-29, he was a member of the United States House 
of Representatives; from 1829-32, United States Min- 
ister to France ; from 1832-34, 1836-39, 1841-45, he 
was a member of the United States Senate ; and from 
1846-53, United States Minister to France, a second 
time. 

From 1853 to 1861, he was in private life, but devot- 
ing his talents and energies with unremitting assiduity to 
the internal improvements of Virginia to education, 
to the Historical Society of Virginia, (of which he was 
President), and to the preparation of his History of the 
Life and Times of James Madison. 

In 1 86 1 he spared no efforts, as a Delegate from Vir- 
ginia to the Peace Conference (Feb., 186 1), to heal the 
disorders of the country, and to prevent war. He re- 
sisted secession (which he never regarded as other than a 
recourse to revolution or rebellion, according to the 
issue), until its consumation by Virginia, in spite of his 
counsel and utmost exertion ; but when his native state 
became actually involved in war, he did not hesitate to 
espouse her cause with all the ardor of his nature. 

After the war, he was chosen by George Peabody, in 
1867, as one of the Trustees of the fund which that emi- 
nent philanthropist dedicated to education in the 
Southern States. 

He died at Castle Hill, Albermarle County, Virginia, 
on the 25th of April, 1868. A marble tablet in Grace 



WILLIAM C. RIVES. 241 

Church, (Walker's Parish, Albermarle,) near Castle Hill, 
bears the following inscription : 

" IN MEMORY OF 

ONE OF THE FOUNDERS 

OF THIS CHURCH, 

WILLIAM CABELL RIVES, L.L.D. 

BORN, 4th MAY, 1793, 

DIED, 25th APRIL, 1868. 

STATESMAN, DIPLOMATIST, HISTORIAN. 

UNITING A CLEAR AND CAPACIOUS INTELLECT, 

A COURAGEOUS AND GENEROUS TEMPER, 

WITH SOUND LEARNING 

AND COMMANDING ELOQUENCE, 

HE WON A DISTINGUISHED PLACE 

AMONG THE FOREMOST MEN 

WHOM VIRGINIA HAS CONSECRATED 

TO THE SERVICE OF THE COUNTRY : 

WHILE HE ADDED LUSTRE TO HIS TALENTS, 

BY THE PURITY AND DIGNITY OF HIS PUBLIC 

CAREER, AND ADORNED HIS PRIVATE LIFE 

WITH ALL THE VIRTUES WHICH CAN 

GRACE THE CHARACTER 

OF HUSBAND, FATHER, FRIEND AND 

CHRISTIAN. 

" BLESSED ARE THE DEAD WHICH DIE IN THE LORD. " 

My intimate personal acquaintance with Mr. Rives 
commenced in 1833, and continued during his life. I 
have never known a man who commanded more of my 
admiration for his abilities, learning and classic taste, nor 

17 



242 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

of my homage for his private and social virtues. Nature 
gave him great capabilities ; especially the four elementary 
principles which constitute the character of every truly 
great man. Those four elementary principles are com- 
mon to the race, differing only in degree. They are, 
first, honesty of purpose; second, practical common 
sense ; third, self knewledge, and fourth, self government. 
Mr. Rives posessed them all in an eminent degree, and 
in harmonious unity. I have known men of more 
impassioned eloquence ; men of more brilliant imagina- 
tions ; men of profounder depths in logic ; but these tran- 
scendant qualities were counterbalanced by correspondent 
defects. 

Mr. Rives had rare opportunities for the acquisition of 
knowledge, and he embraced them with zeal and deter- 
mination. First his collegiate course, then his studies 
under Mr. Jefferson, and his long and intimate personal 
acquaintance and friendship with James Madison. He 
was encouraged in his philosophical studies on the sub- 
ject of Man and his government, by Mr. Jefferson. He 
was led by Mr. Madison to take practical common sense 
views of life, which gave him that thorough conservatism 
which was one of the distinguishing traits of his character. 
He had none of that daring ambition which seeks to 
" rule the worst, by ever daring to be first ; " nor of that 
still more reckless ambition whose motto is, " Rule ae 
ruin. " 

The heroic age of the Republic , the age of wars an k' 
convulsions had passed away ere he arrived at manhood, 
and the age of peace and tranquility had succeeded, an 



WILLIAM C. RIVES. 243 

age peculiarly favorable to the arts of peace, the progress 
in which during the fifty years preceeding the civil war, 
seems more like fancy than reality. 

Mr. Rives' Hfe was one of honorable efibrt to elevate 
his fellow man to a higher plane of usefulness, and there- 
by promote his happiness, in which he succeeded beyond 
most men who were deemed patriots, philosophers and 
philanthropists. His example is a rich legacy to his 
country, more honorable than titles of nobility. More 
precious than gold. 




244 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 



iw^ t^^^^^' 



JOHN CALDWELL CALHOUN. 



I- 







"HE two last great Statesmen of the primitive 
and heroic period of the republic were 
Calhoun and Webster. They were born the same year, 
grew up with their country, and died at nearly the same 
age. They may be pronounced the two great intel- 
lectual champions of the two great physico-political divis- 
ions of the country, the north and the south ; the two 
foremost representatives of the two opposite schools of 
political doctrine, as to the true theory of the federal gov- 
ernment; and long ere that terrible arbitration of arms 
by which was tried the question whether individual States 
could secede from the Union, these great leaders had 
contended over the same question, on the floor of the 



JOHN CALDWELL CALHOUN. 245 

senate, with a power of argument never surpassed, if 
ever equalled, before that body. I shall finish my book 
with a sketch of these two great men. 

John Caldwell Calhoun was born in the district of 
Abbeville, South Carolina, on the 1 8th of March, 1782, 
and died at Washington, March 31, 1850. He was of 
Irish descent on the side of both parents. His grand- 
father came from Donegal, in the north-west of Ireland, 
to Pennsylvania, in 1733, when his father, Patrick Cal- 
houn, was but six years old. The stock was probably 
what is known as Scotch-Irish, and the family was Pres- 
byterian. Moving along the Alleghanies, with the tide of 
migration, the Calhoun family settled on the Kanawha, 
in Virginia. But these settlements being molested 
by the Indians, after Braddock's defeat, they moved fur- 
ther south, and in 1750, established what was known as 
the Calhoun settlement, on the Cherokee frontier, in 
upper South Carolina, and in what is now called the Ab- 
beville district. The pioneer settlers in this region were 
often engaged in conflicts with the Indians, in which the 
father of our subject took a prominent part ; and in the 
Revolutionary struggle, he was an ardent whig, and was 
exposed to much danger from the tories of that section. 
In 1770 he was married to Martha Caldwell, like him- 
self of an Irish Presbyterian family. The third son of 
this union was John C. Calhoun, born as has been re- 
marked, the same year as Daniel Webster. Not only 
were they born about the same time, but both were de- 
scended from a hardy, vigorous stock; from parents of 
stern moral principles, accustomed to hardship and dan- 



246 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

gerand of more than ordinary intelligence and inclination 
to learning. It may be conjectured that there was 
Scotch blood in the veins of Webster as well as Calhoun, 
as the name is said to be Scotch for Weaver. Both were 
nurtured on the frontier, and accustomed in early life to 
the freedom and freshness of nature, and to habits of 
industry and frugality. Both received, as children, 
household instruction, Calhoun little other, and both 
were made familiar with the Bible ; and with both, sub- 
sequent education was gained not without serious strug- 
gles and domestic sacrifices. 

Young Calhoun, at an early age, was a diligent student, 
especially of history and metaphysics, and even injured 
his health by his close application to books. His father 
dying, however, when he was about 13, he continued to 
labor on the farm to aid in the support of the family, and 
postponed his efforts for an education till he could be 
assured of the means without diminishing the support of 
his mother. Persuaded at length by a brother, satisfac- 
tory arrangements was made with that brother and with 
his mother, by which he could carry on his studies ; and 
he entered a private academy, taught by the Reverend 
Doctor Waddell, a brother-in-law, and in two years was 
fitted to enter the junior class of Yale College, from which 
institution he graduated with great distinction, in 1804. 
The president of the college, Doctor Dwight, having 
engaged with him on one occasion in a discussion on the 
origin of political power, said afterward, " That young 
man has talent enough to be President of the United 
States." Three years more were spent at the north, in the 



JOHN CALDWEL[, CALHOUN. 247 

Law School, at Litchfield, Connecticut, when he returned 
to his native district, and soon after commenced the 
practice of law. Besides all his diligence in study, like 
Clay, he had cultivated assiduously and with great 
success, his talents for extemporaneous debate. 

The irritation caused by the claims of Great Britain to 
search American ships, and by other aggressions on our 
commerce, reached his native district, and though in his 
own estimation yet a student, he was appointed to draw 
up a report and resolutions, which he supported in a 
speech of such force that he was elected to the Legisla- 
ture. His service there during that session gave such 
satisfaction that he was chosen to represent the dis- 
trict in Congress, where he took his seat in November, 
181 1, it having been convened by the President a month 
earlier than the regular time. He had been marrie4 in 
May preceeding, to his second cousin, Floride Calhoun. 

Upon entering Congress, he gave up the legal profes- 
sion, though specially gifted for it, and already quite 
successful. The party in favor of war, after a struggle of 
three or four years, at length had a majority in Congress, 
and ardent young .nen like Calhoun, were bent on forcing 
the administration into a war policy. Mr. Calhoun was 
placed on the Committee on Foreign Relations, and on 
the retirement of its chairman, became its head, and 
brought in a bill for an embargo of sixty days, as a meas- 
ure preliminary to a declaration of war. He became in 
fact the leader of the war party . 

His distinguished career in Congress and as a Cabinet 
officer, forms a prominent page in our history. Foresee- 



248 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

ing its importance in a great commercial nation, he was 
a warm advocate of enlarging the navy, a measure which 
became generally popular, after its brilliant success in the 
war with Great Britain. Non-importation and non-inter- 
course had been favorite ideas with his party; but seconded 
by Lowndes and Cheeves, he was largely instrumental in 
exploding the doctrine, and fostering that of diversified 
industries, and extended intercourse with the nations of 
the earth, as a means of building up a broad and enlarged 
civilization. He saw also that a sound and stable national 
currency was most desirable, and warmly advocated a 
national bank. In these broad and statesman- like views, 
the young South Carolina politicians were in advance of 
the Democrats of the Virginia school, which upheld what 
the New England men denounced as a narrow, anti-com- 
mercial policy ; and thus New England and South 
Carolina were drawn towards each other, in a common 
willingness to put down the Virginia dynasty, which it 
was felt was not only narrow in its views, but arrogated 
to itself all political wisdom. This feeling came out 
strongly in connection with the discussions as to the 
estabUshment of a national bank. Mr. Eppes, Jefferson's 
son-in-law, had reported against the measure as unconsti- 
tutional. Mr. Calhoun proposed to meet the difficulty by 
chartering the bank in the district of Columbia. After 
fierce and protracted debate, resulting in a compromise 
among the friends of the measure, a scheme for a bank 
was finally proposed, in which the main features of Mr. 
Calhoun's plan were preserved, and the great necessity 
of some such measure being felt, after the peace with 



JOHN CALDWELL CALHOUN. 249 

Great Britain, a bill was introduced and carried, under 
Mr. Calhoun's leadership, for the establishment of a 
specie-paying bank. 

Mr. Calhoun supported the tariff of 1816, and from 
motives similar to those which led him to favor, at that 
period, a natioi'ial bank. This tariff was designed, not 
merely to bring revenue to the public treasury, but to give 
some encouragement to the manufactures which the 
recent commercial restrictions, the war, and the imposi- 
tion of heavy duties had called into existence, and which 
had been of essential service to the country in a time of 
need. In the abstract, he was in favor of free trade ; but 
he was a statesman who could see when and where ab- 
stract principles of political economy could not be justly 
applied in practice. 

He also favored internal improvements, of a judicious 
character, by the general government, the need of which, 
like that of a national currency, had been disclosed by 
the war. In his advocacy of this measure he was unsuc- 
cessful, President Madison finally vetoing his bill, on 
constitutional grounds. 

His first period of prominent political life, his six years 
of most useful service in the House of Representatives, 
terminated with Mr. Madison's administration. It had 
marked him as one of the foremost rising statesmen of 
the day, and it was but natural that he should be called 
to President Madison's cabinet (18 17) as secretary of war. 
Finding the department greatly disorganized, with $50,- 
000,000 unsettled accounts, he applied himself /igorously 
and successfully to reduce things to order ; and having 



250 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

done this, drew up a plan for the re-organization of the 
aitny, which was adopted by congress, and obtains sub- 
stantially, I think, to the present day. 

As another illustration of Mr. Calhoun's broad and 
liberal spirit, it may be mentioned that though an ardent 
southerner, and jealous of the rights of the south, he 
approved the Missouri Compromise, and held that con- 
gress had the constitutional power to prohibit slavery in 
the territories, but that the prohibition would no longer 
be of binding force when a territory should become a 
state. As a member of Mr. Monroe's cabinet, he coun- 
selled signing the compromise bill. 

In view of his growing fame and popularity at this 
period, it is not surprising that when the question of a 
successor to Mr. Monroe began to be agitated, which was 
soon after the commencement of his second term, in 182 1, 
Mr. Calhoun's name should be prominently mentioned. 
This was especially the case in Pennsylvania, a state 
never very closely bound to party, and a state where he 
was looked upon by intelligent men, as a statesman who 
could rise superior to local interests and party ties, 
and who was disposed, on questions of national import- 
ance, to accord to the general government a large meas- 
ure of powers. But the military prestige of Gen. Jackson 
was so great, and so swayed the popular feeling, that Mr. 
Calhoun's friends withdrew his name as a candidate for 
the highest place. Receiving, however, the support of 
the friends of both Adams and Jackson for the second 
place, he was elected to the vice-presidency, by a large 
majority ; and upon the election of Mr. Adams to the 



JOHN CALDWELL CALHOUN. 25 1 

presidency, by the House of Representatives, he occupied, 
it will at once be seen, a somewhat anomalous position ; 
and although he lentUiis silent support to the coaliiion 
which was soon formed against Mr. Adams, he was not 
conspicuous as an active politician, while serving as vice- 
president. 

The Democratic party had become divided on the 
tariff question, as it came up again at this period, and Mr. 
Calhoun now became the leader of the free trade section, 
deeming that this principle should now prevail over local 
and temporary exigencies. It was in connection with this 
question that he began to develope his peculiar views of 
state rights, and was naturally charged with receding 
from his former liberality. But he had advocated the 
tariff of 1816, not as a permanent policy, but as a tem- 
porary expedient. The contest growing warmer, he fell 
back upon the Virginia and Kentucky resolutions of 
1 798-9, and began to put forth these startling doctrines 
to which was soon appUed the term " nullification." In 
plain English, he taught the right of each state to prevent, 
if she could, the enforcement of any acts of congress 
within her limits which she might deem unconstitutional. 
This doctrine, he more fully enunciated ni the famous 
South Carolina Exposition. It was first brought forward 
prominently in congress in the speech of Mr. Hayne, of 
South Carolina, to which Mr. Webster made his immortal 
reply, and in which he really struck at Mr. Calhoun, 
whom he knew to be its father, and whose great strength 
he also knew. 

It happened to me at this period, as a member of the 



252 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

Legislature of Indiana, to draft some resolutions in 
which this new and dangerous doctrine was denounced, 
and which were laid before Congress by one of the rep- 
y^ resentatives from that state ; and in the winter of 1833, 
I was in Washington, a looker-on amid the exciting 
scenes then being enacted. My resolutions had, I think, 
attracted Mr. Calhoun's attention ; and at this period it 
was that I first formed a somewhat intimate acquaintance 
with the great nullifier, whose private character and 
genius I soon learned to admire. I could not, as a 
patriot, support hi> peculiar views, but esteeming me none 
the less, apparently, on that account, for he loved bold- 
ness and frankness, he honored me with his friendship. 

Gen. Jackson issued his proclamation against the nulli- 
fiers, in December, 1832. Mr. Calhoun was well un ler- 
stood to be the leader of the nullification party, and the 
president's feelings towards him were very bitter. In the 
conduct of the Seminole war, some years before, the gen- 
eral was charged with greatly exceeding his powers in 
the seizure of the Spanish fort of St. Mark's, and especi- 
ally in the arrest and execution of Arbuthnot and Am- 
brister. As a member of Mr. Monroe's cabinet, Mr. 
Calhoun had been in favor of censuring Gen. Jackson, 
while John Quincy Adams had defended him. The gen- 
eral had but recently learned the ground taken by Cal- 
houn at the cabinet meeting alluded to, and though 
years had elapsed, and though he had received the 
highest honors of the republic, the discovery had greatly 
intensified his bitterness towards the arch-nuUifier. In 
his customary high-handed manner, he had given orders 



JOHN CALDWELL CALHOUN. 253 

for the summary arrest of Calhoun, and his colleague, 
Mr. Duffie, in case news should come of any overt act 
of resistance by the nullifiers in South Carolina to the 
laws of the United States. I had become aware of this 
order, and was the first person to inform Mr. Calaoun 
that a warrant had been issued for his arrest. A more 
astonished man cannot well be imagined. His utter- 
ances in regard to old Hickory were the reverse of com- 
plimentary, nor can I aver that no profane expressions 
escaped his lips. But then it is said that even Washing- 
ton was once known to utter an oath. 

Fortunately for both of these sons of South Carolina and 
for the country, a compromise was effected, under the 
magic influence of Mr. Clay; the odious tariff was 
modified ; South- Carolina was molified, and found a loop- 
hole of retreat ; her distinguished senator escaped arrest ; 
nullification and rebellion lowered their crest, and 
disappeared from the political arena. 

I need not say much more of his public Hfe. Accept- 
ing the compromise measures as to a tariff, he joined 
with Clay and Webster in opposing General Jackson's 
course as to the United States Bank, and supported Mr, 
Clay's resolutions against the removal of the public 
deposits from the bank, under the President's order, in a 
speech of great energy and power, in which he accused 
the President of a desire to wield despotic power, and to 
" unite in his own hand, the sword and the purse. " It 
was not that he was wedded to the idea of the per- 
manence of the bank ; he looked upon it only as a tem- 
porary measure and in this light was willing that the 



254 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

bank whose re-charter the president had vetoed, should 
continue twelve years longer. 

On the slavery question, which began soon after to be 
the great question before the country, Mr. Calhoun was 
frankly out-spoken. Strange as it may seem to us that a 
man of his clear, penetrating intellect could have reached 
such a conclusion, he declared his conviction that slav- 
ery was a positive political and social good. Unlike 
most of the leading politicians, he never sought to evade 
the question. On the contrary, he was in favor of forc- 
ing the slavery issue on the north, and declared his con- 
viction that he was in error, in his former views as to 
the Missouri Compromise. He was, if not the author, 
the chief promoter of the scheme for the annexation of 
Texas, being then Secretary of State, in Mr. Tyler's 
Cabinet, from which Mr. Webster had been excluded, 
but he was much opposed, in the Mexican War which 
followed, to any permanent conquest of Mexico, and 
denied the wisdom and necessity of the Monroe doc- 
trine. 

I may say, with truthfulness, that I knew Mr. Calhoun 
long and well. Great as were his intellectual powers, both 
natural and acquired, they were in some sense lost sight 
of in colloquial and social intercourse with him. In such 
favored hours, there was a frankness, simplicity and kind- 
ness that put you at your ease, and you felt that he 
treated you as an equal. He was especially fond, as Mr. 
Webster has observed, of the society of young men, and 
was never more pleased than when, surrounded by them, 
listening to his views, so clearly and so forcibly expressed. 



JOHN CALDWELL CALHOUN. 255 

on the subject of government ; not the mere party ques- 
tions of the day, but the broad principles that underlie 
all temporary questions and issues. His language at such 
times was not ornate, nor his manner impassioned, but 
there was a clearness and yet profoundity about his ideas, 
that charmed every one who esteemed logic more than 
rhetoric. He was not fascinating, like Mr. Clay, but 
your admiration for him was deeper, stronger, and far less 
sensuous than it was wont to be for the " great com- 
moner " — a man wh©m, while you admired him, you 
saw to have his weaknesses, and felt to be more showy 
than solid. Mr. Calhoun rarely spoke of the politicians 
of the day, and never of their schemes and plans. He 
was, indeed, a statesman of enlarged views, of unselfish 
patriotic sentiments, but it must be admitted, with intense 
love for the south, and especially for South Carolina. It was 
this that led him astray. Fervently patriotic, he allowed 
the fervor of his patriotism to rest upon one portion of his 
country. He was like the mother, who in an excessive 
love for one of her children, neglects the rest. In short, 
his faults resulted from the excesses of his virtues. At 
home, he was almost adored. The love that his people 
felt for him was in proportion to their knowledge of him. 
A personal friend, who had the very best opportunity 
to know him well, has enabled me to depict his traits of 
character, as exhibited in private life, at his cherished 
home — "Fort Hill," and his impressions entirely agree 
with my own. Socially, he was the most genial and 
agreeable of companions. He entered into the enjoy- 
ments of those around him with a symypathy and 



256 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

kindness, that endeared him to all. He loved to pro- 
mote innocent mirth, and though no jester him- 
self, laughed heartily at the jests of others. Though 
his conversation was dignified, and did not, of its 
own accord, descend to trivial subjects, yet women and 
children, as well as grave men; the ignorant as 
well as the learned; all alike delighted in his society 
and left it with regret. His peculiar charm was his 
untiring forgetfulness of self, and his delicate attention 
to the feelings and wishes of others, which made 
him the most truly polite man I have ever known. In 
this he was perhaps equal to DeQuincy, without his 
morbid sensitiveness. I never saw him depressed, or out 
of humor. He was fond of reading, and in his youth, 
had devoted much of his leisure to books ; but neither his 
multifarious occupations nor his cast of mind, permitted 
him to be a general, undiscriminating reader. He read 
to inform himself, and was well informed ; but his opinion, 
often expressed, was, that reading made a secondary, 
thinking an original, mind. He did not disdain, but 
highly enjoyed good poetry, good novels, and able 
reviews. He was also very fond of Scotch and Irish 
songs and ballads, his favorites among which he would 
call for, evening after evening, and listen to them with 
unfailing pleasure. 

He was not wealthy, but his pecuniary means, under 
his excellent management, were amply sufficient for the 
wants of his family. According to the fashion of his 
part of the country, he kept open house, and the family 
seldom sat down alone to a meal. Though himself 



JOHN CALDWELL CALHOUN. 257 

uncommonly temperate in all things, he enjoyed, in mod- 
eration, the pleasures of the table, at which he was fond 
of seeing all the family assembled. He used to say that 
good digestion depended greatly on cheerfulness and 
equanimity, and he took the lead in promoting conversa- 
tion and gaity at the table. 

He rose early, and devoted his mornings to writing. 
He walked a great deal over his plantation, personally 
superintending its minutest operations, and was the first 
in that region to cultivate grain and cotton for market. 
He devoted much time and attention to the raismg of 
fruit, and had the very finest melons, figs, peaches and 
other southern fruits, also, apples, pears, cherries, grapes, 
strawberries, raspberries, etc. These, however, he did 
not raise for sale, but gave them to his neighbors and 
others. His servants were treated with kindness, and 
were very fond of him. His home was peculiarly dear to 
him, and when absent he was always impatient to return 
to it. While there, his agricultural interests and social 
duties, together with his large correspondence, occupied 
most of his time. 

Nature, in all her moods and changes, was charming to 
him. He sympathized strongly with her beauty and her 
grandeur. The mountains near his residence were wild 
and picturesque, and he highly enjoyed excursions among 
them. 

In his own person he was tall and slender. His coun- 
tenance was marked by decision and firmness ; in conver- 
sation it became highly animated and expressive. His 

18 



258 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

large, dark, brilliant eyes strongly impressed all who 
encountered their glances. 

But no sketch of Mr. Calhoun would be complete if it 
did not embrace some portion at least of the eulogy pro- 
nounced upon him by Mr. Webster, in the United States 
senate, just after his death. Mr. Webster, after alluding 
to their similarity of age and their long acquaintance, and 
remarking that he found Mr. Calhoun in the House of 
Representatives when he entered that body in May, 1813, 
says : — 

" From that day to the day of his death, amidst all the 
strifes of party and politics, there has subsisted between 
us, always, and without interruption, a great degree of 
personal kindness. Differing widely on many great ques- 
tions respecting our institutions and the government of 
the country, those differences never interrupted our per- 
sonal and social intercourse. I have been present at most 
of the distinguished instances of the exhibition of his tal- 
ents in debate. I have always heard him with pleasure, 
often with much instruction, not unfrequently with the 
highest degree of admiration. 

Mr. Calhoun was calculated to be a leader in whatso- 
ever association of political friends he was thrown. He 
was a man of undoubted genius and of commanding talent. 
All the country and all the world admit that. His mind 
was both perceptive and vigorous. It was clear, quick, 
and strong. Sir, the eloquence of Mr. Calhoun, or 
the manner in which he exhibited his sentiments 
in public bodies, was a part of his intellectual character. 
It grew out of the great qualities of his mind. It was plain, 
strong, terse, condensed, concise; sometimes impas- 
sioned, still always severe. Rejecting ornament, not often 
seeking far for illustration, his power consisted in the 
plainness of his propositions, in the closeness of his logic, 
and in the earnestness and energy of his manner. These 
are the qualities, as I think, which have enabled him 



JOHN CALDWELL CALHOUN. 259 

through such a long course of years, to speak often and 
yet always command attention. * * * 

There was a cliarm in his conversation not often 
equalled. He delighted especially in conversations and 
intercourse with young men. I suppose that there has 
been no man among us who had more winning manners 
in such an intercouise and such conversation, with men 
comparatively young, than Mr. Calhoun. I believe one 
great power of his character in general, was his conver- 
sational talents. * * # 

He has lived long enough, has done enough, and he 
has done it so well, so successfully, so honorably, as to 
connect himself for all time, with the records of his 
country. He is now an historical character. Those of us 
who have known him here, will find that he has left upon 
our minds and upon our hearts a strong and lasting impres- 
sion of his person, his character, and his public perform- 
ances, which, while we live, shall never be obliterated. 
We shall hereafter, I am sure, indulge it as a grateful 
recollection, that that we have lived in his age, that we 
have been his contemporaries, that we have seen him, 
and heard him, and known him." » * * 

A sketch of Mr. Calhoun would also be incomplete, 
without some notice of his writings. Aside from his 
published speeches, the most important productions of 
his pen are two posthumous treatises — the first, " A Dis- 
quisition on Government; " the second, "A Discussion 
on the Constitution and Government of the United 
States." These works are but little known in the Northern 
States, but are deserving of careful examination by every 
poUtical student. The former is a singularly clear and 
original exposition of the origin and nature of government 
in general. He derives the necessity and origin of gov- 
ernment from man's social nature, and firom the fact that 
his direct or individual affections are stronger than his 



26o REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

sympathetic or social feelings. This gives rise to rivalr} , 
to conflict, to the struggles of selfishness. This in turn, 
renders necessary some common, controlling, restraining 
power, and this power, of whatever form, and however 
excercised, is government. But government itself tends 
to abuse, to tyranny ; and the most enlightened commu- 
nities have found necessary something that shall regulate 
and restrain government, and prevent abuse, and this is 
embodied by them in their constitution, or fundamental 
laws. Government he holds to be of Divine ordination, 
as to its essential elements, while the forms by which it is 
administered, the checks and guards by which it is regu- 
lated, are devised by man. The great question, with all 
enlightened nations, has been, how best to adjust this 
needful check and balance, so that government, while it 
shall protect the people, shall itself be kept within its 
proper bounds. 

In discoursing upon the subject further, he discusses the 
general matter of Hberty, the principles of numerical and 
concurrent majorities, and presents the salient features of 
the Roman and English governments. The longer treatise, 
upon the Constitution and Government of the United 
States, is but a continuation and application of the former 
one, and is the great argument on what may be called 
the southern view of the subject. But it would be doing 
great injustice to the work to imagine that because it 
maintains the extreme southern doctrine of state rights, it 
is not worthy of attention. It is on the contrary a most 
valuable contribution to our political writings. 

I do not wish to trace Mr. Calhoun's course and career, 



JOHN CALDWELL CALHOUN. 26 1 

on the slavery question. That he was most honest and 
sincere, none can doubt. On the other hand, many will 
not hesitate to believe that he was in the right, as to the 
impolicy and injustice of the Mexican war. His was a 
far-seeing mind, and he apprehended more fully than most 
of our statesmen did, the dangers which threatened the 
stability of our Government and the continuance of the 
Union. He heartily deprecated all aggrandizement of the 
republic at the expense of her honor and justice. 

His last great effort was a written speech, read for him 
by a senator, March 4, 1849. He was suffering from 
pulmonary and heart disease, and at the time, unable to 
appear in the senate. The speech was a defence of the 
rights of the south, and predicted disunion, if the further 
agitation of the subject of slavery was not prevented. He 
declared an amendment of the Constitution necessary 
though he did not specify its nature, it is supposed by 
some that he contemplated the election of two presidents, 
one from the north and one from the south, whose joint 
assent should be given to all laws passed by Congress. 
He appeared in the senate, March 13, (1849), for the 
last time ; made some brief replies to the answers of 
Webster and Cass to his written speech, and sunk back in 
his seat exhausted. He was carried to his lodgings, and 
to his bed, from which he never rose again. In his death 
the country lost one of her greatest and noblest states- 
men, 

" Firm in his purposes, patriotic and honest, as I 
am sure he was in the principles he espoused and in the 
measures he defended," " I do not beheve," says Mr. 



262 



REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 



Webster, " that aside from his large regard for that species 
of distinction that had conducted him to eminent stations 
for the benefit of the republic, he had a selfish motive 
or a selfish feeling." 




DANIEL WEBSTER. 263 



Cijajittr ^mdtJc, 




DANIEL WEBSTER. 

pATURE is cliary of her choicest gifts. 
H*^ Common things she bestows in abundance ; 
others more rarely. This is especially true of the higher 
gifts of intellect. The world has seen but one Plato ; 
but one Shakspeare. To America has been given but 
one Webster ; and in breadth, in massiveness, in power, 
in capacity, his was an intellect that has seldom been 
equalled among the great men of earth. For this pre- 
eminence we can assign no sufficient secondary causes. 
But it impressed me as it did all others, I suppose, who 
ever saw and heard him. In his very port and 
countenance nature set her seal to his greatness. The 
childhood and youth of such a man are of deepest 



264 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

interest. We expect to find in them somewhat that is 
extraordinary ; and in this case we are not disappointed. 

The parents of Daniel Webster were settlers on the 
frontier of the wilds of New Hampshire ; and if ster- 
ling qualities of mind and heart command our respect, 
they were highly respectable people. But they were not 
superior to many of the sturdy puriteans of New Eng- 
land of that period. We find that in 1757, at the age of 
eighteen, Ebenezer Webster, (the father of Daniel 
Webster,) was one of a band of picked men known as 
Roger's Rangers, and that with such young heroes as Stark 
and Putnam, he helped to defend the homes of loved 
ones against the hostile incursions of the French and 
Indians. At the age of thirty-six, when he had become 
the father of a young family, he served well as a militia 
captain with Stark at Bennington, and was in the sub- 
sequent battles at White Plains and Saratoga, and be- 
came a colonel. The mother, a second wife, was a 
woman of excellent qualities, with a robust but womanly 
intellect, and a true womanly heart. But neither parent 
would seem to have been the prototype, in any marked 
degree, of their illustrious son. Upon the strong, vigorous 
stock, which he inherited from them, nature was pleased 
however to graft some of her choicest scions. 

Nor was his extraordinary inborn greatness the result 
of any felicitous combination of surrounding circum- 
stances. His father had purchased a tract of land in 
the wilds of New Hampshire, and after the Revolutionary 
struggle was over, had cleared a few acres, built a log- 
cabin, and made his growing family a new home. Here 



DANIEL WEBSTER. 265 

it was, in a small framed addition to the structure of logs, 
that the great future statesman and orator of the repub- 
lic, itself just born, first saw the light, on the i8th of 
January, 1782. 

In the presidential canvass of 1840 in a campaign 
speech at Saratoga, Mr. Webster, in reply to a taunt 
which stignatized the whig nominee. General Harrison, as 
the " log cabin candidate, " happily said : " It is only 
shallow pretenders who either make distinguished origin 
a matter of personal merit, or obscure origin a matter of 
personal reproach. Taunt and scoffmg at the humble 
condition of early life, affect nobody in this country, but 
those who are foolish enough to indulge in them. * * 
It did not happen to me to be born in a log cabin, but 
my elder brothers and sisters were born in a log cabin 
raised amid the snow-drifts of New Hampshire, at a 
period so early, as that when the smoke first rose from 
its rude chimney, and curled over the frozen hills, there 
was no similar evidence of a white man's habitation 
between it and the settlements on the rivers of Canada. 
Its remains still exist. I make it an annual visit. I carry 
my children to it, to teach them the hardships endured 
by the generations which have gone before them. I love 
to dwell on ihe tender recollections, the kindred ties, the 
early affections, and the touching narrations and inci- 
dents, which mingle with all I know of this primitive 
family abode. I weep to think that none of those who 
inhabited it are now among the living ; and if ever I am 
ashamed of it, or if I ever fail in affectionate veneration 
for Aim who raised it and defended it against savage 



266 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

violence and destruction, cherished all the domestic 
virtues beneath its roof, and through the fire and blood 
of a seven-years' Revolutionary war, shrunk from no 
danger, no toil, no sacrifice to serre his country, and to 
raise his children to a better condition than himself, may 
my name, and the name of my posterity, be blotted 
forever from the memory of mankind." 

What a glimpse of early days, and a great heart withal, 
without which there is no great soul ! Here, then, in this 
humble frontier abode, Daniel Webster was born. The 
revolution was drawing to a close. The preliminary 
treaty of peace was signed just one year later ; and the 
conscious life of the child who was to grow into so great a 
man, maybe said to be coeval with the independence and 
national existence of the country whose youthful greatness 
he was so signally to illustrate, and the integrity of whose 
constitution and government he was so ably to defend. 
Tiie same Omniscient wisdom which deposited coal and 
iron in the earth for man's use long ages ere man himself 
appeared, prepares men for the time of need. Webster 
lived through almost three-fourths of the first century of 
his country's Hfe, and next after Washington, is unmis- 
takably the man who has been most widely known and 
revered, in the world, as a great citizen of the new repub- 
lic of the west. And from such a parentage and such a 
home as have been described, it does not seem unfitting 
that such a man should have come. It now remains to 
note some of the more striking incidents of his career, 
and to sketch the prominent features of his great charac- 
ter. 



DANIKL WEBSTPJR. 267 

Delicate in constitution as a child, he was less engaged 
in out-door tasks than his brothers, and was sent more 
constantly to school, when a school was near enough for 
him to go. His brothers were accustomed to say good 
naturedly, that " the reason why Dan was sent so much 
to school was that he might know as much as other 
boys." Already he was recognized as a genius and the 
future scholar of the family. When school was too far 
away, and when he was exempted from labor, he tell 
much under the instruction of his mother. In such a 
family, it was natural that the first book in which chil- 
dren read was the Bible. Grasping a knowledge of the 
signs of written thought, as gifted children .sometimes 
do, almost by intuition, he astonished his mother one day 
by reading to her some verses from the Bible almost be- 
fore she knew he had mastered the alphabet. While 
a child, neighbors, and travellers — for as was often done 
by new settlers, his father had opened his house to way- 
farers — were accustomed to listen with admiration to his 
readings from the Scriptures. We see in this childish 
accomplishment the germs of his gifts and powers as an 
orator. The simple language of the Scriptures became 
eloquent as he uttered it in ears probably not over-criti- 
cal. Serious by nature, the truths which the words en- 
folded, took hold of his young imagination, and, we can- 
not doubt, had much to do with the developement of 
his mind. His frequent and effective exercises in read- 
ing aloud may well have awakened his first aspirations to 
be an orator. 

When a little older, an incident occurred, which had 



268 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

it happened in the childhood of an orator of ancient 
Rome, would have been the basis of a marvelous legend. 
From some strolling peddlers, our young Bible-reader ob- 
tained a copy of the Constitution of the United States, 
printed on a handkerchief. He had doubtless heard the 
newly formed government, and the Constitution upon 
which it was based, made the subject of earnest discussion. 
And as it was a matter of present and pressing interest, 
it is not to be wondered at that it excited his curiosity. 
Possessed of the important document, he soon committed 
it to memory ; an act not without its influence in making 
him, in after life, the Great Expounder of the Constitu- 
tion. From that time, like Calhoun, he was a student of 
the government and history of his country. 

Another characteristic incident occurred still later. He 
became temporarily an office boy for a neighboring 
lawyer. Havmg Httle to do, in the absence of his em- 
ployer, he naturally examined such miscellaneous books 
as he found in the office. Passing by such as might 
more naturally have attracted the attention of a boy fond 
of reading, he took up a Latin Grammar, and strange as 
it may seem, committed its contents to memory. He 
was by this time old enough and intelligent enough to 
know that this was a necessary and preliminary part of 
the acquisitions of a scholar, which he aspired to be; and 
the fact cannot but be regarded as a remarkable indica- 
ion of a mind and judgment that in later life was to 
move the world. 

The young lawyer (Mr. W. T. W, Thompson;, in 
whose office this feat occurred, was naturally surprised, and 



DANIEL WEBSTER. 269 

thought such a mind ought to have some higher employ- 
ment. He soon mentioned the matter to his father, who 
though pleased, did not seem to be surprised, but began 
to think of the lawyer's advice. The result was a deter- 
mination, in which the family all concurred, to send 
Daniel to Phillip's Academy, not far distant, to fit him 
to teach school. Presenting himself in due time for ex- 
amination before the venerable Dr. Abbot, long princi- 
pal of the Academy, a Bible was placed in his hands, and 
a chapter designated to read. Generally a few verses 
sufficed ; but as he went on, the grave doctor of divinity 
listened with rapt attention. Such reading he had never 
perhaps heard before ; and after recovering a little from 
his astonishment, when the chapter was ended, his first 
words were, "Young man, you can enter this institu- 
tion." 

He remained at the Academy but nme months, but 
not being tied to a formal routine, he made most rapid 
progress. The secret of his rapid acquisition was not 
simply his own extraordinary talent, for mere ability is 
not achievement ; but that he gave his whole strength to 
the task before him, or which he set himself. To satisfy 
his own thirst for learning called forth all his energies ; 
but being modest in his own estimate of his attainments, 
and ignorant of the devices by which superficial and dis- 
honest scholars make a fair show, he felt, for a time, a 
keen sense of inferiority to his classmates, who had 
reached their place by much slower steps. Added to 
this, his youth and rustic garb and bashful manner sub- 
jected him to some gibes and sneers from older boys who 



270 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

had come from homes of wealth and aristocratic pre- 
tensions. Studying, however, with the utmost diligence, 
sometimes weeping in secret over his fancied inferiority, 
and then studying again harder than ever, at length came 
one of the occasions for examination for sifting and pro- 
motion. Passing through the ordeal triumphantly, his 
teacher announced his success, complimented him on 
his remarkable progress, directed him to join a higher 
class, and turmng to his classmates said : " Boys, you 
will take your final leave of Webster, for you will never 
see him again. " 

The winter following the close of his connection with 
the Academy, he taught school, much doubtless to his 
own benefit as well as those of his pupils. Attracting 
the attention of the learned and benevolent Dr. Wood, 
of Boscawen, (not far from Salisbury where the Webster's 
lived,) who was a distinguished patron of promising 
young men, the result as might be expected, was the ex- 
pression of a strong desire that he might resume his 
studies. He became for some months a pupil of Dr. 
Wood, who then consulted with his father as to sending 
him to college. This had been beyond his ambition, but 
at length, in a spirit of sacrifice and fine family aftection, 
it was decided that he should go, and he entered Dart- 
mouth College, in 1797. What sort of a student he 
was there, is best told in the words of Prof. Shurtlifi": 
" Mr. Webster, while in college, was remarkable for his 
steady habits, his intense application to study, and his 
punctual attendance upon all the prescribed exercises. I 
know not that he was absent from a recitation, or from 



Daniel Webster. 271 

morning and evening prayers in the chapel or from pub- 
lic worship on the Sabbath ; and I doubt if ever a smile 
was seen upon his face during any religious exercise. 
He was always in his place, and with a decorum suited 
to it. He had no collision with any one, nor appeared 
to enter into the concerns of others, but emphatically 
minded his own business. But as steady as the sun, he 
pursued with intense application^ the great object for 
which he came to college." This serves to explain and 
illustrate the character of his genius and of his greatness. 
His greatness was not of that dazzling, meteoric kind, 
which now shines out and startles, and now is dark and 
hidden, but it was steady and solid, and for this reason is 
truly appreciated only by thoughtful minds. It will 
readily be understood why he preferred Cicero, as an 
orator, to Demosthenes. 

It is a singular circumstance, that while at the 
Academy in Exeter, he could not speak in public — not 
even give a declamation. This is partly explained per- 
haps by his diffidence; but rather it was due to that 
reluctance which a great soul sometimes feels to begin to 
do that which it nevertheless feels it has a mission to per- 
form. His natural talent in oratory could not, however, 
long remain in abeyance or undiscovered. In his junior 
year, when not yet seventeen, at the joint request of the 
students and citizens, he delivered a fourth of July 
oration. His choice of subject was felicitious. " On 
occasions like this," he said, " you have hitherto been 
addressed on the nature, the origin, the expediency of 
civil government. The field of political speculation has 



272 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

here been explored by persons possessing talents to which 
the speaker of the day can bear no pretensions. Declin- 
ing, therefore, a dissertation on the principles of civil 
polity" — of which nevertheless he was by no means igno- 
rant — " you will indulge me in slightly sketching those 
events which have originated, nurtured, and raised to its 
present grandeur this new empire." The simplicity and 
dignity of sentences like these, in the exordium of a youth 
of less than seventeen, is extraordinary, and furnishes a 
presage of the oratory of the matured man. 

It would be a mistake, however, to suppose that the 
gravity, maturity and steadiness of his youthful character 
was unrelieved by any lighter traits. On the contrary, 
he had a keen relish for amusement, at proper times, and 
a great fund of humor. The moment he had finished his 
intellectual labor, and sought relaxation, he was trans- 
formed into a perfect embodiment of sport ; and he was 
always noted for ready wit. Having a task set one day 
to perform with his brother Ezekiel, in their father's 
absence they concluded to put it off till the next day, 
but not without some misgiving. Returning at night and 
seeing the work left undone, the father demanded of 
Ezekiel, as the elder, "what have you been doing all 
day ? " " Nothing, sir," replied the boy. "And what 
ha,vQ you been doing, Daniel?" "Helping Zeke, sir," 
said the quick-witted brother, in a solemn tone. This 
disarmed the parental displeasure, which was not great, 
as the boys were diligent and industrious, as a rule. 

On another occasion, the boys were discussing some 
knotty point as they were about to go to bed, when in 



DANIEL WEBSTER. 273 

the vehemence of the debate, the bed clothes were set on 
fire. Hearing the noise and repairing to the room, the 
father demanded to know what was going on. Ezekiel 
was silent and abashed; but Daniel quickly replied, "We 
were seeking light sir, on a certain subject, and I confess 
that we got more than we wanted ! " 

The anecdote of the hanging of the scythe has often 
been told. During a long vacation Daniel was helping 
in the hay-field, but was at the same time much inter- 
ested in a certain book. He complained to his father 
that his scythe did not hang right. It was adjusted for 
him. In no long time came another complaint and 
adjustment of the same character. Finally, upon a third 
complaint, his father told him he must hang it to suit 
himself ; whereupon he gravely hung it upon a neigh- 
boring apple tree, and went to his book. 

As a student in college, he was equal to the best, in 
the classics and mathematics, but did not seek to be 
distinguished in them. He merely gave them their full 
meed of attention, as disciplinary studies. He did not 
aspire to be a philologist or mathematician. But in 
moral philosophy and rhetoric, he had no competitor, and 
in college oratory, no rival. His great pre-eminence as a 
student was in natural and international law. With a 
maturity of mind far beyond his years, he mastered the 
lore of the subject, and studied all that pertained to the 
origin and character of the government of his own country 
and those of other lands ; thus laying broadly the founda- 
tion of his subsequent unequalled greatness as a consti- 
utional lawyer. 

19 



274 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

I need not follow Mr. Webster through college. He 
began to read law with his patron, Mr. Thompson, of 
Salisbury. Soon rising to the level of his instructor, he 
completed his course with Gov. Gore, of Boston, a man 
of genius, learning and ability. He read thoroughly in 
the higher departments of the law ; sometimes translating 
the Latin and the Norman French of the old books into 
good English — a most valuable exercise. He also in- 
formed himself in the history of law ; and though without 
the guidance of such recent writers as Lingarrl, Turner 
and Hallam, his acute and comprehensive mind was at 
no loss in tracing the connection between law and his- 
tory for himself. 

Completing his course and admitted to the bar, he be- 
gan the practice of his profession in his native state, near 
his birth place. He took this step, against the urgent 
advice of his Boston friends, at the promptings of filial 
affection, to be near his now aged father. It is one of 
the most engaging traits of his character, that he ever 
cherished his parents with ardent and grateful affection. 
Though placed in a remote and obscure field, his success 
was rapid and his reputation spread apace. His first 
plea in court, like his first public oration when in college, 
and his first speech in congress, marked him as an extra- 
ordinary man. But relinquishmg his practice in Bos- 
cawen to his brother Ezekiel, whose education he had in- 
sisted should be provided for, as well as his own, he 
removed to Portsmouth, N. H., where he entered upon 
a wider field at the age of nearly 25, and a few months 
later was married to his first wife, Grace Fletcher, a lady 



DANIEL WEBSTER. 275 

of rare beauty, amiability and accomplishments. Six 
years of the happiest period of his life passed away here, 
ere he entered upon that more public sphere in which 
the world soon marked liim as one of her great intellects ; 
and to this more secluded period he was accustomed to 
look back with fond recollections. 

We may pause for a moment here and note the esti- 
mate formed of him by intelligent and discerning men. 
The celebrated lawyer, Jeremiah Smith, of Portsmouth, 
said of him at this period : " In single qualities, I have 
known men superior to Mr. Webster. Hamilton had 
more original genius; Ames greater quickness of imagina- 
tion. Marshall, Parsons and Dexter were as remarkable 
for logical strength, but in the union of high intellectual 
qualities, I have known no man equal to Daniel 
Webster." Such was the opinion formed of him by a 
man himself superior, ere he had come before the world in 
those great displays of intellectual power, that have made 
his name immortal. 

Although Mr. Webster evinced no over-weening ambi- 
tion to enter public life, it was not in the nature of things 
that he could long remain in a private sphere. The great 
question now agitating the public mind was that of war 
with England No man had studied the question more 
carefully or calmly than Mr. Webster. He did not sym- 
pathize with Bonaparte and France as against England. 
At a convention in his own county, called to consider 
fhe state of the nation, he supported an address and some 
resolutions, of which he was said to be the author, in a 
powerful speech, which at once attracted general atten- 



276 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

tion. The speech is not preserved, but from the hour of 
its deHvery he was acknowledged to be the leading spirit 
of the state. Subsequent speeches confirmed this feeling; 
and in November, 1812, war having already been de- 
clared by congress against Great Britain, he was elected 
to that body, by a popular vote, and took his seat at the 
early session, called in May following. The eloquent 
and astute Henry Clay was elected speaker, and speedily 
announced the important committees. Upon one of 
those committees appeared the name of Daniel Webster, 
who was quite unknown to most of his fellow members, 
but whose transcendent abilities had not escaped the eagle 
eye of Mr. Clay. His attention had been drawn to him 
by means probably of some extracts from his speeches, 
in Northern papers. 

Modest and self-contained, the young congressman 
bided his time. It had been difficult to know on what 
basis exactly war had been declared against England. 
It was finally settled that the chief reason was her orders 
in council by which she had laid an embargo on French 
ports, and reclaimed her seamen and citizens v/ho had 
deserted her, in time of need. Mr. Webster, while not 
inchned to admit this claim, as an abstract principle of in- 
ternational law, did not fail to observe that it was one here- 
tofore usually admitted, and he deemed that the action of 
congress had been hasty in declaring war. But more than 
this, France had first done what was complained of in 
England, and England had done it in self defence. Mr. 
Webster therefore introduced some resolutions, the in- 
tent of which was to ascertain more clearly the grounds 



DANIEL WEBSTER. 277 

on which the government had acted. In short he de- 
termined to make the administration confess either a con- 
spiracy with France, against England, or a most un- 
seemly partiality for France and her unscrupulous ruler. 
These resolutions he "supported in his maiden speech ; 
in which the clearness of statement, the breadth of learn- 
ing, the power of argument and unmistakable evidence 
of oratorical power, not only arrested but soon riveted 
the attention of the House. At its close, he was felt to 
be one of the foremost men of the country. 

" At the time this speech was delivered," says Chief 
Justice Marshall, "I did not know Mr, Webster; but I 
was so struck with it that I did not hesitate to state that 
Mr. Webster was a very able man, and would become 
one of the very first statesmen in America, and perhaps 
the very first. " We are reminded of the words of 
Tacitus : "In the most splendid fortune, in all the dig- 
nity and pride of power, is there anything," he asks, 
" that can equal the heartfelt satisfaction of the able ad- 
vocate, when he sees the most illustrious citizens, men 
respected for their years and flourishing in the opinion of 
the public, yet paying their court to a rising genius ? " 

Mr. Webster, however, was not a frequent speaker in 
Congress. From the outset, it was his practice not to 
speak on many questions, but only on important ones, 
and when, as it came to be the case, something seemed 
to be expected from him. During this session, he spoke 
in favor of a strong navy for purposes of national de- 
fence; for although he thought the war uncalled for, 
he was for a vigorous prosecution of it, in a defensive man- 



278 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

ner, but not in the form of invasion, His course at this 
period contrasts favorably with the rash counsels of some 
of the hot headed young men from the South, and among 
them Mr. Calhoun. 

Elected almost as a matter of course to the next con- 
gress, he found the question of a United States Bank 
one of the most important that came before it. He was 
not opposed to a bank of a reasonable and safe character, 
but like Mr. Calhoun deemed that such an institution was 
was then needed. The bank proposed was, however, in 
his judgment, of a "most extraordinary and alarming 
character." It would be utterly impossible for it, he 
said, "to pay its notes, and yet, it would continue to pour 
out its paper so long as government could apply it in 
any degree to its purposes. * » * « What sort of an 
institution sir, " he continued, " is this ? It looks less 
like a bank, than a department of government. It will 
be properly the paper-money department. Its capital is 
government debt ; the amount of its issues will depend 
on government necessities ; government, in effect, ab- 
solves itself from its own debts to the bank, and by way 
of compensation, absolves the bank from its own con- 
tracts with others. This is indeed a wonderful scheme 
of finance. The government is to grow rich, because it 
is to borrow of a bank which issues paper without liability 
to redeem it. The contrivers of this system provide for 
an unlimited issue of paper, in an entire exemption from 
payment. * * * 

They trust not in the ability of the bank, but in its 
beggary ; not in gold and silver collected in its vaults, to 



DANIEL WEBSTER. 279 

pay its debts and fulfill its promises, but in its locks and 
bars, provided by statute, to fasten its doors against the 
solicitations and clamors of unfortunate creditors." 

This speech made a powerful impression on Congress, 
and the whole of it is worth reading at this time, when finan- 
cial schemes essentially analagous are proposed. The 
bill was lost, but he moved a reconsideration, and a better 
one was passed in the House, amended chiefly from his 
own suggestions, but it was lost in the Senate, 

In the month of December, 1813, Mr. Webster had 
lost his home in Portsmouth, by fire, with his library, 
notes, memoranda — all the visible fruits of his former 
reading. This to an ordinary man would have been a 
staggenng blow ; but to him it proved otherwise. Study- 
ing with increased zeal and industry, the next two years, 
he laid anew the foundations of legal and political learn- 
ing, and more broadly and massively than before ; and 
coming with renewed preparation into the Fourteenth 
Congress, he found the old war party clamorous for a 
high protective tariff to pay off the war debt, having failed 
through his timely opposition to get a bank that could 
pay it with worthless paper. Here again, he took a con- 
servative course. New England at that period was more 
interested in commerce than in manufactures, and did not 
thmk so much as she did afterward of the merits of a 
protective tariff. But the Southern and Middle States, 
especially Pennsylvania, were bent on such a tariff, and 
a bill was carried. If it be said that Mr. Webster himself 
favored the same sort of legislation at a later period, it 
may be replied that not only had the interests of his con- 



28o REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

stituency changed, but he may be allowed to see some 
cause, like other men, to change his opinions. But upon 
questions involving principles rather than policy he did 
not change. It may reasonably be urged, moreover, 
that when various forms of a manufacturing industry have^ 
been called into being, by the policy of government, 
seeking to reduce its own indebtedness, there is an injus- 
tice in an abrupt change of policy. So Mr. Webster 
felt. 

In 1816, Mr. Webster was instrumental in carrying 
through a policy, brought forward by him, and embodied 
in what was known as the " specie resolution." The 
intent of this resolution was, that all debts due the gov- 
ernment should be paid in gold and silver, or in the bills 
of such banks as paid specie at their counters. This was 
the first great step taken in this country to establish a 
uniform currency. The measure proved so popular, that 
it passed at once. For it, we are indebted to Daniel 
Webster. 

It would exceed my powers, — carry me beyond the 
reasonable limits of this sketch, and my book, to attempt 
to trace Mr. Webster's whole career in congress, or his 
great success and renown as a lawyer. In the latter 
capacity, he came, by common consent, I believe, to 
stand at the head of the profession. There was no 
other man at the same time, so profound in all the lore 
of the law, in all its departments ; so able in argument ; 
so powerful with judge and jury, and so entirely removed 
from all suspicion of dishonest and sophistical ways. It 
came to be a matter of course that in great cases he was 



DANIEL WEBSTER. 251 

upon one side or the other, if it was possible to secure 
his services. Mr. Seward once said the fifty thousand 
lawyers of the United States, interested to deny liis preten- 
sions, conceded to him an unapproachable supremacy at 
the bar. There were those who equalled, and perhaps in 
general estimation excelled him, in cases that involved 
only the technicalities of the law or its practice ; but when 
a cause involving fundamental principles, a knowledge 
of man's nature, of the structure of human society, and 
of the foundations of human rights was in hand, no one 
could stand beside him. 

His first great case, which gave him large pubUcity, 
after his removal from Portsmouth to Boston, in 1817, 
was his defence of the Kennistons, charged with highway 
robbery, and his subsequent conviction of Goodridge, 
(the man who alleged the robbery to have been perpe- 
trated upon himself,) on a charge of malicious prosecu- 
tion. Then came the Dartmouth College case. This 
raised him to the pinnacle of forensic fame, a position 
fi-om which he could never be displaced. It is said that 
Judge Story sat four hours, pen in hand, ready to make 
notes on doubtful points, and listened to the great advo- 
cate, but never put pen to paper. The truth was, he 
covered the whole ground, and removed every objection 
as he went along, so carefully, so completely, so con- 
vincingly, that there was no question left. His case 
was gained. In his own words : "It was the case, not 
merely of Dartmouth college, but every college in the 
land. It was more. It was the case of every eleemo- 
synary institution throughout the country. It was even 



26 2 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

more. It was the case of every man who had property 
of which he might be stripped ; for the question was : 
Shall our state legislatures be allowed to take that which 
is not their own, and turn it from its original use, and 
apply to it such ends or purposes as they, in their dis- 
cretion, shall see fit?" A great principle was settled,]in 
this case, for all coming time. The effect of the ^speech, 
upon the grave and learned men who heard it, as it is 
described, can scarcely be credited. It stands out, as 
a parallel to the reply to Hayne in the senate ; as one of 
the great, unequalled efforts of his great mind. 

I have listened to Mr. Webster, on the floor of the 
Senate, with the most earnest attention, and my own 
estimate of him as an orator may be briefly stated. 
Dividing great orators into the two great classes of those 
who reach and sway men chiefly by intellectual fervor, and 
those who impress and move them by intellectual strength, 
he belongs decidedly to the latter class ; Henry Clay to 
the former. Clay reached chiefly the sensibilities, the 
emotions. Webster aimed at the reason of the hearer, 
his moral convictions. He always begun a speech with 
moderation, with dignity, and with grace. He was the 
courtly gentleman, the ripe scholar, the calm reasoner. 
There was no urgency, no vehemence, no haste. Your 
feehngs were not consciously stirred, but your assent was 
challenged by clear statements, in whicli he excelled all 
other men that I have heard, and by 1 )gical argument. 
You felt that the orator was greater than his subject ; 
that he had mastered it, but that it did not master him ; 
that he was not putting forth all his strength; that a great 



DANIEL WEBSTER. 283 

reserve lay behind, to be called out, if needed; and that 
he was calmly sure of his positions. This gave him great 
advantage. The listener could not but feel that he was 
equal to any emergency. That if his opponents had 
new squadrons of fact and proof to bring forth, he had 
more. This calm, majestic array of his intellectual forces, 
and prosecution of his purpose, gave him a great 
superiority over his opponents. Without seeming to have 
hasted or tired, you saw at length that he had gained an 
impregnable position, and could not be dislodged ; and 
it was only when in his occasional magnificent bursts of 
patriotism and lofty indignation against injustice, he rose 
up to a full exertion of his strength, that you realized 
how great an orator and a man stood before you. 

Mankind will always be more easily affected by that 
which is sensational and superficial than by that which is 
calm and convincing. But the effect is not lasting. 
Webster as an orator and statesman, built on solid foun- 
dations ; and while Washington has left us the price- 
less legacy of an example which shows that in the 
man of action genius and integrity of character outweigh 
all else, Webster has left us a no less important example 
of the nature of true and honest oratory ; of true oratory 
everywhere, but especially in the forum and the senate. 
By his lofty example, we learn that such oratory needs 
not the studied, meretricious arts of rhetoric; is not 
aided by vehemence of voice, extravagance of gesture, 
paradoxes of statement or novelties of expression ; that it 
consists in saying what is proper to be said, in simple, 
straightforward language, with honest intent. With such 



284 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

oratory, he swayed and satisfied whatever audience might 
hear him. He was equally efifective before an assembly 
of cultivated, literary men, or a mass meeting of the 
yeomanry of the country ; before a conclave of senators > 
or the bench of the Supreme Court of the United 
States. 

One striking quality of his speeches, namely, their 
clearness and perspicuity, is well illustrated in an anec- 
dote told of David Crockett, the illiterate, but shrewd and 
humorous hunter, sent to Congress from one of the new 
districts in Tennessee. Having heard Mr. Webster in the 
senate for the first time, and approaching him afterwards 
somewhat unceremoniously, he said : " Why, Mr. Web- 
ster, yoii are not one of them great men ; I could under- 
stand every word you said ! " It may well be believed, 
that no compliment (for he doubtless perceived readily 
enough the irony of Crockett's speech, in regard to would 
be great men), ever pleased him more. 

His model in oratory, if he had any, was Alexander 
Hamilton. At all events, his style resembles that of 
Hamilton more than any other American speaker and 
writer, and Mr. Webster's own ideal of oratory is a just 
exposition of what was common to both of them ; and 
though his views have often been quoted, they are always 
worth reading: "True eloquence," he says, "does not 
consist in speech. It cannot be brought from far. Labor 
and learning may toil for it, but they will toil in vam. 
Words and phrases may be marshalled in every way, but 
they cannot compass it. It must exist in the man, in the 
subject, and in the occasion. Affected passion, intense 



DANIEL WEBSTER. 285 

expression, the pomp of declamation, all may aspire after 
it, but they cannot reach it. It comes, if it comes at all, 
like the outbreaking of a fountain from the earth, or the 
bursting forth of volcanic fires, with spontaneous, original 
native force. The graces taught in the schools, the costly 
ornaments and studied contrivances of speech, shock and 
disgust men, when their own lives and the fate of their 
wives, their children, and their country, hang on the 
decision of the hour ; then words have lost their power, 
and rhetoric is vain, and all the elaborate oratory is con- 
temptible. Even genius itself then feels rebuked and 
subdued, as in the presence of higher qualities. Then 
patriotism is eloquent ; then self-devotion is eloquent. The 
clear conception outrunning the deductions of logic, the 
high purpose, the firm resolve, the dauntless spirit speak- 
ing on the tongue, beaming from the eye, informing every 
feature, and urging the whole man onward — right onward 
to his object — this, this is eloquence ! " 

Mr. Webster had great felicity in making short, 
impromptu speeches, as well as in his more studied, 
elaborate efforts. He was semper paratus. His intel- 
lect was not only strong beyond measure, but graceful 
and flexible. Like the elephant's trunk, which can uproot 
a tree, or pick a pin from the ground, it could adapt itself 
to great and small occasions. Standing one day on the 
veranda of Gadsby's Hotel, in Washington, with a num- 
ber of acquaintances from Virginia, Mr. Webster was 
observed coming down the side-walk. Mr. Catlett, one 
of the group, who was a warm friend and ardent admirer 
of the great expounder, approached him, and after a 



286 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

previous apology, said to him, " Mr. Webster, Captain 
Phillip Slaughter, of Virginia, an old revolutionary officer, 
a friend of Washington, and a companion in arms with 
Judge Marshall, is in the parlor of the hotel, and I am 
sure would be glad to see you, sir, if you have a few 
moments to spare." " Introduce me to him, sir, intro- 
duce me," replied the Senator, and entering the parlor, 
with the by-standers following — Mr. Catlett said, " Cap- 
tain Slaughter, this is Mr. Webster." The old soldier 
rose from his seat, and Mr. Webster advancing with that 
dignity and grace which were natural to him, tDok his 
extended hand, and with little preface of the common 
place words of greeting, said, " Sir, I am told that I 
have the honor to take by the hand, a soldier of the revo- 
lution ; a companion in arms of Washington and Mar- 
shall, and that noble band of heroes who won for us the 
independence of our country ; by the aid of whose valor 
we now form one of the nations of the earth. Sir, I am 
glad to meet you ; I am glad to meet any revolutionary 
soldier of Virginia. Virginia, sir, stood shoulder to 
shoulder with Massachusetts, my adopted State, and with 
New Hampshire, my native State, in the great struggle 
in which you bore a part. Virginia gave to the oppressed 
colonies, their great leader in the struggle — our beloved 
Washington. I was not born soon enough to be a soldier 
of the revolution ; but my father was at Bennington, and 
White Plains ; and on the plains of Saratoga, he helped 
to give a staggering blow to the supremacy of British 
arms. Captain Slaughter, I am glad to have seen you, 
and to express my gratitude to you and to all like you, 



DANIEL WEBSTER. 287 

who hazarded their lives and endured many hardships 
that the people of our colonies might be delivered from 
oppression, and enabled to establish a more just govern- 
ment for the preservation of their rights and liberties. 
May a benign Providence bless your remaining years, 
and may you be gathered to your fathers in peace. Sir, 
I bid you a grateful farewell." 

I am indebted to a friend for a sketch of Mr. Webster 
as he appeared in an episode of a political canvass. The 
occasion was the campaign of 1840, which resulted in 
the election of General Harrison to the Presidency . My 
friend says: "Mr. Webster having attended a great 
mass meeting in the southern part of Vermont, on 
one of the plateaus of the Green Mountains, con- 
sented to speak at Bellows Falls, Vt., on his way to 
Boston. I went twenty-five miles to see and hear hmi. 
I reached the public square already packed with an 
expectant but orderly and quiet crowd, made up of the 
better class of the people of the place and surrounding 
country, and of both parties. In a short time, Mr. Web- 
ster emerged from a hotel, and proceeding across the 
square, the observed of all observers, took a convenient 
position on the roof of the veranda of another hotel. As 
he moved along I was at once struck with the mingled 
majesty and grace of his form and gait. As he appeared 
upon the veranda, and was greeted by the people, it 
seemed to me as if his physical frame, though well knit 
and by no means slender, was scarcely equal to the tow- 
ering intellect that rested upon his brow, and marked his 
very presence. 



288 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

He began his speech with the utmost simphcity and 
plainness. His thoughts were in no sense common place, 
but he seemed as an athlete, disporting himself easily and 
gracefully, with but slight display of strength. Alluding 
to the opening of the campaign, he appealed to the 
reason and not to the passions of his audience 

Addressing himself in the course of his remarks to the 
democrats present, including a number from the part of 
New Hampshire on the opposite bank of the Connecti- 
cut, he spoke in terms of great respect of some parts of 
the Administration of Gen. Jackson, and alluded to his 
co-operation with him in the needful work of meeting 
and opposing the doctrines as well as the overt acts of 
nullification. He then spoke in somewhat disparaging 
terms of Mr. Van Buren, the general's successor, saying, 
with the nearest approach in his speech, so far, to any 
thing like impassioned tone or gesture, that compared 
with old Hickory, he was but as a rush-light to the mid- 
day sun. I need not repeat, and in fact do not very fully 
remember, mu'-h of the political argument of his speech, 
for I was more interested in the man than in his words. 
It was but a slight effort doubtless, as con pared with one 
of his great speeches, but clear, logical and convincing. 
He had consented to speak only to gratify some who 
could not attend the mass meeting of the previous day , 
and while his remarks were to the purpose, and vastly 
more interesting and instructive than the ordinary 
platitudes of political speeches, he excused himself from 
saying much, on account of previous fatigue. 

There was one passage, and manifestation of the man. 



DANIEL WEBSTER. 289 

in the speech, however, that I most vividly remember. 
Complimenting Vermont, in a few felicitous phrases, on 
her political fidelity — she was then designated as the 
state wliere the star of whig ascendancy never set — he 
turned his great lustrous eyes upon the rugged eminence 
known as Fall Mountain, that lay in full view before him, 
just across the Connecticut ; and after a comprehensive 
glance up and down a landscape of singular majesty and 
beauty, he said in a tremulous voice : " Would that I 
could say as much of my own native state, some of 
whose citizens are perhaps within the sound of my voice, 
and some of whose granite rocks, wooded slopes and 
smiling fields I see before me. " The well of feeling was 
evidently stirred in his great bosom ; and as electric cor- 
ruscations sometimes flit across the sombre horizon in a 
midsummer's eve, too distant to allow the ear to catch 
the sound of the following thunder peal, so across his 
marked, swarthy, but finely contoured features, strong 
emotions flitted while his magnificent voice was hushed 
in silence. There he stood, grandly human, but seem- 
ingly almost more than human. Not so much apart 
from other men, however, as above them. There stood 
by him or near him the more notable men of the vicinity, 
great some of them, to common apprehension, in their 
narrow spheres, but beside liim, how insignificant. 1 
fear that much of the reverence that I felt for some of 
them was lifted from and rested upon one to whom a 
young man like myself might well do homage. 

In the evening, it chanced that I had the honor of an 
ntroduction, at the house where he rested. Never be- 

20 



290 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

fore or since, I can truly say, did the same kind of a 
feeling of profound homage come over me, as I stood in 
the presence of a mortal like myself If I laid my hand 
on my heart ere it was extended to take his own, and I 
was addressed in a few civil words, it was an instinctive 
act ; and you will think me more weak than egotistic, 
perhaps, if I add, that so deep was the impression made 
on me by this great man that I used for some time, in 
the vagaries of dreamland, to think that I met him and 
heard from him some kind words of counsel. 

The next day Mr. Webster took the stage coach for 
Boston. Passing over into Walpole, N. H., to get a better 
view of the Connecticut river valley, the party alighted 
from the coach, as it climbed a hill, and one of them 
went to a farmhouse by the roadside to get a draught of 
water, saying to the good woman of the house that Mr. 
Webster was along, and would like to drink from the 
spring. Hastily supplying the needed vessels, she was 
seen hurrying to the gate, her homespun apron doing 
service on the way as a towel to dry her hands, moist 
with some household task. It was said that the gleam 
of pleasure depicted in Mr. Webster's face, as he took 
her eager hand and heard her artless words of gratifica- 
tion at the sight of the great son of her native state, was 
quite as vivid as that which shone in her own. 



The foregoing incidents have never appeared in any 
book written about Mr. Webster, I suppose, and so may 
be worth your attention. 



DANIEL WEBSTER. 29 1 

My task is about completed. No justice can be done 
to such a man, in a single chapter ; but I only proposed 
to give a few reminiscences. As I have a little space 
left, I am told, I will give a few short extracts from his 
speeches. Such extracts are among the best photographs 
that can be taken of a man's genius, in its different 
phases. 

The two first shall be, one from his Fourth of July ora- 
tion, delivered at Hanover, when but a boy in college, 
and one from his masterly speech on the Greek Revolution. 
They will serve to mark the growth of his intellect and 
the formation of his style, between the dawn and maturity 
of manhood : . 

"We have seen our fathers, in the daysof our country's 
trouble, assume the rough habiliments of war, and seek 
the hostile field. Too full of sorrow to speak, we have 
seen them wave a last farewell to a disconsolate, woe- 
stung family. We have seen them return, worn down 
with fatigue, and scarred with wounds ; or we have seen 
them perhaps, no more. For us they fought — for us 
they bled — for us they conquered. Shall we, their de- 
scendants, now basely disgrace our lineage, and pusil- 
lanimously disclaim the legacy bequeathed to us ? Shall 
we pronounce the sad valedictory to freedom and im- 
mortal liberty on the altars our fathers have raised to her ? 
No ! The response of the nation is ' No ! ' Let it be 
registered in the archives of heaven. Kre the religion 
we profess, and the privileges we enjoy, are sacrificed at 
the shrine of despots and demagogues — let the sons of 
Europe be vassals; let her hosts of na'ions be a vast con- 
gregation of slaves ; but let us, who ire this day free, 
whose hearts are yet unappalled, and whose right arms 
are yet nerved for war ; assemble before the hallowed 
temple of American freedom, and swear, to the God of 
our fathers, to preserve it secure, or die at its portal !" 



292 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

From Speech on the Greek Revohition, in the House 

of Representatives, January 19, 1824, at the age of 42: 

"In the next place, I take it for granted that the poUcy 
of this country, springing from the nature of our govern- 
ment and the spirit of all our institutions, is, so far as it 
respects the interesting questions which agitate the pres- 
ent age, on the side of liberal and enlightened sentiments. 
The age is extraordinary ; the spirit that actuates it is 
peculiar and marked ; and our own relation to the times 
we live in, and to the questions which interest them, is 
equally marked and ])eculiar. We are placed, by our 
good fortune and the wisdom and valor of our ancestors, 
in a condition in which we can act no obscure part. Be 
it for honor, or be it for dishonor, whatever we do is not 
likely to escape the observation of the w^orld. As one of 
the free states among the nations,* as a great and rapidly 
rising republic, it would be impossible for us, if we 
were so disposed, to prevent our principles, our senti- 
ments, and our example from producing some effect 
upon the opinions and hopes of society throughout the 
civilized world. It rests probably with ourselves to de- 
termine whether the influence of these shall be salu- 
tary or pernicious." 

From Address at the laying of the corner-stone of 

Bunker Hill Monument, June 17, 1825: 

"We come, as Americans, to mark a_^spot which must 
forever be dear to us and our posterity. We wish that 
whosoever, in all coming time, shall turn his eye hither, 
may behold that the place is not undistinguished where 
the first great battle of the revolution was fought. Wc 
wish that this structure may proclaim the magnitude and 
importance of that event to every class and every age. 
We wish that infancy may learn the purpose of its 
erection from maternal lips, and that weary and withered 
age may behold it, and be solaced by the recollections 
which it suggests. We wish that labor may look up 
here, and be proud, in the midst of its toil. We wish 



DANIEL WEBSTER. 293 

that, in those days of disaster, which, as they come upon 
all nations, must be expected to come upon us also, des- 
ponding patriotism may turn its eyes hitherward, and be 
assured that the foundations of our national power still 
stand strong. We wish that this column, rising toward 
heaven among the pointed spires of so many temples 
dedicated to God, may contribute also to produce, in all 
mmds, a pious feeling of dependence and gratitude. 
We wish, finally, that the last object on the sight of him 
who leaves his native shore, and the first to gladden his 
who revisits it, may be something which shall remind 
him of the liberty and the glory of his country. Let it 
rise, till it meet the sun in his coming; let the eariiest 
light of the morning gild it, and parting day linger and 
play on its summit." 

From Eulogy on Adams and Jefferson, delivered in 

Faneul Hail, Aug. 2, 1826. 

"Neither of these great men, fellow-citizens, could have 
died, at any time, witho'.it leaving an immense void in 
our American society. They have been so intimately, 
and for so long a time, blended with the history of the 
country, and especially so united, in our thoughts and 
recollections, with the events of the revolution, that the 
death of either would have touched the strings of public 
sympathy. We should have felt that one great link, con- 
necting us with former times, was broken ; that we had 
lost something more, as it were, of the presence of the 
revolution itself, and of the act of independence, and 
were driven on, by another great remove, from the days 
of our country's early distinction, to meet posterity, and 
to mix with the future. Like the mariner, whom the 
ocean and the winds carry along, till he sees the stars 
which have directed his course and lighted his pathless 
way descend, one by one, beneath the rising horizon, we 
should have felt that the stream of time had borne us 
onward till another great luminary, whose light had 
cheered us and whose guidance we had followed, had 
sunk away from our sight." 



294 REMINISCENCES OF DISTINGUISHED MEN. 

From Eulogy on Washington, in the city of Washing- 
ton, Feb. 22, 1832, 

"Gentlemen, the spirit of human liberty and of free 
government, nurtured and grown into strength and 
beauty in America, has stretched its course into the 
midst of the nations. Like an emanation from heaven, 
it has gone forth, and it will not return void. It must 
change, it is fast changing, the face of the earth. Our 
great, our high duty is to show, in our own example, that 
this spirit is a spirit of health as well as a spirit of power ; 
that its benignity is as great as its strength ; that its 
efficiency to secure individual rights, social relations, and 
moral order, is equal to the irresistible force with which 
it prostrates principalities and powers. The world, at 
this moment, is regarding us with a willing, but some- 
what of a fearful admiration. Its deep and awful anxiety 
is to learn whether free states may be stable as well as 
free ; whether popular power may be trusted as well as 
feared ; in short, whether wise, regular and virtuous self- 
government is a vision for the contemplation of theorists, 
or a truth established, illustrated and brought into prac- 
tice in the country of Washington." 

I can only add a brief summary of the lead- 
ing events of the latter portion of his life. He 
was in the Senate continuously from 1827 to 1841. 
He lost his first wife in January, 1828, and was married 
again in December, 1829. His distinction and eminence 
as a statesman and jurist was enhanced by his services as 
Secretary of State for Presidents Harrison and Tyler, 
1841-3, and for President Fillmore, 1850. He was 
again in the Senate from 1845 ^o 1850^ making the 7th 
of March Speech, so called, in that last year. In 185 1, 
he delivered on the 4th of July a magnificent address on 
the occasion of laying the corner-stone for the extension 



DANIEL WEBSTER. 



295 



of the capitol, in Washington. In 1852 he expected, 
but failed to receive the whig nomination for the presi- 
dency, it being given to Gen. Scott, and died October 24, 
of the same year. He caused to be inscribed upon his 
tomb his firm belief in Christianity. 




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ERRATA. 

Page 1, 3d Jine read "Frances" for "Francis." 

" 1,3d line from bottom, read "close" for "class." 
" 9, 13th line from top, read ''him" for "his ftither." 
" 10, -Ith " " bottom, read ''Thersites" for "Theo- 
sites." 

Page 10, od line from bottom, omit "his." 
" 20, 10th line fi-om top, read "imagined" for "imaged." 
" 33,1st " read "endorsed for "endossed." 
" 34. 3d " " "hurtling" for "hustling." 
' 36, 13th " omit "hence," 

" 139, transpose the 6th and 7th lines from the bottom, 
and words at end of lines 6, 7 and 8 from bottom. 

Page 194, 2d line from bottom, for "election" read "erection." 
" 210, 5th line, for "Gobell" read "Cabell." 
" 289, 4th line from bottom, insert ''them," after "from." 



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